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EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND 


^- 


THE 


EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND 


TWO   COURSES   OF  LECTURES 


BY 

Sir  J.  R.  SEELEY,  K.C.M.G.,  Litt.D. 

EEOnJS   PEOFESSOB   OF    MODERN    fflSTORT   IN   THE   UNIVERSITY  OF  CAMBRIDGE 

FELLOW  OF   GONVILLE   AND   CAICS   COLLEGE  ;    FELLOW   OF  THE   ROYAL 

HISTORICAL    SOCIETY,     AND    HONORARY     MEMBER    OF    THE 

HISTORICAL    SOCIETY    OF    MASSACHUSETTS 


BOSTON 

LITTLE,  BROWX,  AND   COMPANY 

1905 


All  rights  reserved 


LIBRARY 
VNiYEU-r.   M    TALIFORN] 
SANTA  BARBARA 


PREFACE 

In  preparing  these  lectures  for  the  press  I 
have  been  much  indebted  to  Professor  Cowell, 
who  was  good  enough  to  take  an  interest  in 
that  part  of  them  which  relates  to  India,  and 
to  Mr.  Cunningham,  the  author  of  that  most 
interesting  book,  The  Growth  of  English  Indiistry 
and  Commerce. 


CONTENTS 

COURSE  I 
LECTURE  I 

PAGE 

Tendency  in  English  History  .  ,  .  1 

LECTURE  II 
England  in  the  Eighteenth  Century  .  .        20 

LECTURE  III 
The  Empire        ......        44 

LECTURE  IV 
The  Old  Colonial  System      .  .  .  .66 

LECTURE  V 
Effect  of  the  New  "World  on  the  Old      .  .        90 

LECTURE  VI 
Commerce  and  War      .....       114 

LECTURE  VII 
Phases  of  Expansion   .....       138 

LECTURE  VIII 
Schism  in  Greater  Britain    ....       164 


VIU  THE  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND 


COUESE  II 

LECTURE  I 

PAGE 

History  and  Politics  .....       189 

LECTURE  II 
The  Indian  Empire       .....       207 

LECTURE  III 
How  WE  Conquered  India      ....       228 

LECTURE  IV 
How  WE  Govern  India  ...      251 

LECTURE  V 
Mutual  Influence  of  England  and  India  .       272 

LECTURE  VI 
Phases  in  the  Conquest  of  India    .  .  ,      294 

LECTURE  VII 
Internal  and  External  Dangers      .  .  .      317 

LECTURE  VIII 
Recapitulation  ......      340 


FIRST  COURSE 


LECTUEE  I 

TENDENCY   IN   ENGLISH   HISTORY 

It  is  a  favourite  maxim  of  mine  that  history,  while  it 
should  be  scientific  in  its  method,  should  pursue  a 
practical  object.  That  is,  it  should  not  merely  gratify 
the  reader's  curiosity  about  the  past,  but  modify  his 
view  of  the  present  and  his  forecast  of  the  future. 
Now  if  this  maxim  be  sound,  the  history  of  England 
ought  to  end  with  something  that  might  be  called  a 
moral.  Some  large  conclusion  ought  to  arise  out  of 
it ;  it  ought  to  exhibit  the  general  tendency  of  English 
affairs  in  such  a  way  as  to  set  us  thinking  about  the 
future  and  divining  the  destiny  which  is  reserved  for 
us.  The  more  so  because  the  part  played  by  our 
country  in  the  world  certainly  does  not  grow  less 
prominent  as  history  advances.  Some  countries,  such 
as  Holland  and  Sweden,  might  pardonably  regard 
their  history  as  in  a  manner  wound  up.  They  were 
once  great,  but  the  conditions  of  their  greatness  have 
passed  away,  and  they  now  hold  a  secondary  place. 
&  B 


2  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

Their  interest  in  their  own  past  is  therefore  either 
sentimental  or  purely  scientific;  the  only  practical 
lesson  of  their  history  is  a  lesson  of  resignation. 
But  England  has  grown  steadily  greater  and  greater, 
absolutely  at  least  if  not  always  relatively.  It  is  far 
greater  now  than  it  was  in  the  eighteenth  century ; 
it  was  far  greater  in  the  eighteenth  century  than  in 
the  seventeenth,  far  greater  in  the  seventeenth  than 
in  the  sixteenth.  The  prodigious  greatness  to  which 
it  has  attained  makes  the  question  of  its  future 
infinitely  important  and  at  the  same  time  most 
anxious,  because  it  is  evident  that  the  great  colonial 
extension  of  our  state  exposes  it  to  new  dangers,  from 
which  in  its  ancient  insular  insignificance  it  was 
free. 

The  interest  of  English  history  ought  therefore  to 
deepen  steadily  to  the  close,  and,  since  the  future 
grows  out  of  the  past,  the  history  of  the  past  of 
England  ought  to  give  rise  to  a  prophecy  concerning 
her  future.  Yet  our  popular  historians  scarcely  seem 
to  think  so.  Does  not  Aristotle  say  that  a  drama 
ends,  but  an  epic  poem  only  leaves  off?  English 
history,  as  it  is  popularly  related,  not  only  has  no 
distinct  end,  but  leaves  off  in  such  a  gradual  manner, 
growing  feebler  and  feebler,  duller  and  duller,  towards 
the  close,  that  one  might  suppose  that  England,  instead 
of  steadily  gaining  in  strength,  had  been  for  a  century 
or  two  dying  of  mere  old  age.  Can  this  be  right  1 
Ought  the  stream  to  be  allowed  thus  to  lose  itself 
and  evaporate  in  the  midst  of  a  sandy  desert  1  The 
question  brings  to  mind  those  lines  of  Wordsworth  : 


I  TENDENCY  IN  ENGLISH  HISTOEY  3 

It  is  not  to  be  thought  of  that  the  flood 
Of  British  freedom,  which  to  the  open  sea 
Of  the  world's  praise,  from  dark  antiquity 
Hath  flowed  "with  pomp  of  waters  unwithstood," 
Roused  though  it  be  full  often  to  a  mood 
Which  spurns  the  check  of  salutary  bands, 
That  this  most  famous  stream  in  bogs  and  sands 
Should  perish,  and  to  evil  and  to  good 
Be  lost  for  ever — 

Well !  this  sad  fate,  which  is  "  not  to  be  thought  of," 
is  just  what  befalls,  if  not  the  stream  itself  of  British 
freedom,  yet  the  reflection  of  it  in  our  popular 
histories. 

Now  suppose  we  wish  to  remedy  this  evil,  how 
shall  we  proceed?  Here  is  no  bad  question  for 
historical  students  at  the  opening  of  an  academic 
year,  the  opening  perhaps  to  some  of  their  academic 
course.  You  are  asked  to  think  over  English  history 
as  a  whole  and  consider  if  you  cannot  find  some 
meaning,  some  method  in  it,  if  you  cannot  state  some 
conclusion  to  which  it  leads.  Hitherto  perhaps  you 
have  learned  names  and  dates,  lists  of  kings,  lists  of 
battles  and  wars.  The  time  comes  now  when  you 
are  to  ask  yourselves,  To  what  end  1  For  what 
practical  purpose  are  these  facts  collected  and 
committed  to  memory?  If  they  lead  to  no  great 
truths  having  at  the  same  time  scientific  generality 
and  momentous  practical  bearings,  then  history  is 
but  an  amusement  and  will  scarcely  hold  its  own 
in  the  conflict  of  studies. 

No  one  can  long  study  history  without  being 
haunted  by  the  idea   of   development,  of  progress, 


4  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

We  move  onward,  both  each  of  us  and  all  of  us 
together.  England  is  not  now  what  it  was  under  the 
Stuarts  or  the  Tudors,  and  in  these  last  centuries  at 
least  there  is  much  to  favour  the  view  that  the 
movement  is  progressive,  that  it  is  toward  something 
better.  But  how  shall  we  define  this  movement,  and 
how  shall  we  measure  it  ?  If  we  are  to  study  history 
in  that  rational  spirit,  with  that  definite  object  which 
I  have  recommended,  we  must  fix  our  minds  on  this 
question  and  arrive  at  some  solution  of  it.  We 
must  not  be  content  with  those  vague  flourishes  which 
the  old  school  of  historians,  who  according  to  my  view 
lost  themselves  in  mere  narrative,  used  to  add  for 
form's  sake  before  winding-up. 

Those  vague  flourishes  usually  consisted  in  some 
reference  to  what  was  called  the  advance  of  civilisation. 
No  definition  of  civilisation  was  given ;  it  was  spoken 
of  in  metaphorical  language  as  a  light,  a  day 
gradually  advancing  through  its  twilight  and  its  dawn 
towards  its  noon ;  it  was  contrasted  with  a  remote 
ill-defined  period,  called  the  Dark  Ages.  Whether  it 
would  always  go  on  brightening,  or  whether,  like  the 
physical  day,  it  would  pass  again  into  afternoon  and 
evening,  or  whether  it  would  come  to  an  end  by  a 
sudden  eclipse,  as  the  light  of  civilisation  in  the 
ancient  world  might  appear  to  have  done,  all  this  was 
left  in  the  obscurity  convenient  to  a  theory  which 
was  not  serious,  and  which  only  existed  for  the 
purpose  of  rhetorical  ornament. 

It  is  a  very  fair  sample  of  bad  philosophising,  this 
theory  of  civilisation.     You  have  to  explain  a  large 


I  TENDENCY  IN  ENGLISH  HISTORY  5 

mass  of  phenomena,  about  which  you  do  not  even 
know  that  they  are  of  the  same  kind — but  they 
happen  to  come  into  view  at  the  same  time ; — what 
do  you  do  but  fling  over  the  whole  mass  a  word, 
which  holds  them  together  like  a  net  1  You  carefully 
avoid  defining  this  word,  but  in  speaking  of  it  you 
use  metaphors  which  imply  that  it  denotes  a  living 
force  of  unknown,  unlimited  properties,  so  that  a 
mere  reference  to  it  is  enough  to  explain  the  most 
wonderful,  the  most  dissimilar  effects.  It  was  used 
to  explain  a  number  of  phenomena  which  had  no 
further  apparent  connection  with  each  other  than  that 
they  happened  often  to  appear  together  in  history ; 
sometimes  the  softening  of  manners,  sometimes 
mechanical  inventions,  sometimes  religious  toleration, 
sometimes  the  appearance  of  great  poets  and  artists, 
sometimes  scientific  discoveries,  sometimes  constitu- 
tional liberty.  It  was  assumed,  though  it  was  never 
proved,  that  all  these  things  belonged  together  and 
had  a  hidden  cause,  which  was  the  working  of  the 
spirit  of  civilisation. 

We  might  no  doubt  take  this  theory  in  hand,  and 
give  it  a  more  coherent  appearance.  We  might  start 
with  the  one  principle  of  freedom  of  thought,  and 
trace  all  the  consequences  that  will  follow  from  that. 
Scientific  discoveries  and  mechanical  inventions  may 
flow  from  it,  if  certain  other  conditions  are  present ; 
such  discoveries  and  inventions  coming  into  general 
use  will  change  the  appearance  of  human  life,  give  it 
a  complicated,  modern  aspect ;  this  change  then  we 
might  call  the  advance  of  civilisation.     But  political 


6  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

liberty  has  no  connection  with  all  this.  There  was 
liberty  at  Athens  before  Plato  and  Aristotle,  but 
afterwards  it  died  out ;  liberty  at  Eome  when  thought 
was  rude  and  ignorant,  but  servitude  after  it  became 
enlightened.  And  poetical  genius  has  nothing  to 
do  with  it,  for  poetry  declined  at  Athens  just  as 
philosophy  began,  and  there  was  a  Dante  in  Italy 
before  the  Renaissance,  but  no  Dante  after  it. 

If  we  analyse  this  vague  sum-total  which  we  call 
civilisation,  we  shall  find  that  a  large  part  of  it  is 
what  might  be  expected  from  the  name,  that  is,  the 
result  of  the  union  of  men  in  civil  communities  or 
states,  but  that  another  part  is  only  indirectly  con- 
nected with   this  and  is  more   immediately  due   to 
other  causes.     The  progress  of  science,  for  example, 
might  be  held  to  be  the  principal  factor  in  civilisation, 
yet,  as  I  have  just  pointed  out,  it  by  no  means  varies 
regularly  with  civil  well-being,  though  for  the  most 
part  it  requires  a  certain  modicum  of  civil  well-being. 
That  part  of  the  human  lot  "  which  laws  or  kings  can 
cause  or  cure  "  is  strictly  limited.     Now  history  may 
assume  a  larger   or  a  narrower   function.     It  may 
investigate  all  the  causes  of  human  well-being  alike ; 
on  the  other  hand  it  may  attach  itself  to  the  civil 
community  and   to   the   part   of  human  well-being 
which   depends  on   that.     Now   by   a  kind   of   un- 
conscious tradition  the  latter  course  has  more  usually 
been  taken.     Run  over  the  famous  histories  that  have 
been   written;   you   will  see  that  the  writers  have 
always  had  in  view,  more  or  less  consciously,  states 
and  governments,  their  internal  development,  their 


I  TENDENCY  IN  ENGLISH  HISTORY  7 

mutual  dealings.  It  may  be  quite  true  that  affairs 
of  this  kind  are  not  ahvays  the  most  important  of 
human  affairs.  In  the  period  recorded  by  Thucydides 
the  most  permanently  important  events  may  have 
been  the  philosophical  career  of  Socrates  and  the 
artistic  career  of  Phidias,  yet  Thucydides  has  nothing 
to  say  of  either,  while  he  enlarges  upon  wars  and 
intrigues  which  now  seem  petty.  This  is  not  the 
effect  of  any  narrowness  of  view.  Thucydides  is 
alive  to  the  unique  glory  of  the  city  he  describes ; 
how  else  could  he  have  "vvTitten  (f)iXoKaXov/j-ev  fier 
€VT€\e[a<;  koX  (f)i\oao(})ov/jL€v  dvev  fMaXaKLWi  ?  nay, 
so  far  as  that  glory  was  the  result  of  political  causes, 
he  is  ready  to  discuss  it,  as  that  very  passage  shows. 
It  is  with  purpose  and  deliberation  that  he  restricts 
himself.  The  truth  is  that  investigation  makes  pro- 
gress by  dividing  and  subdividing  the  field.  If  you 
discuss  everything  at  once,  you  certainly  get  the 
advantage  of  a  splendid  variety  of  topics;  but  you 
do  not  make  progress ;  if  you  would  make  progress, 
you  must  concentrate  your  attention  upon  one  set 
of  phenomena  at  a  time.  It  seems  to  me  advisable 
to  keep  history  still  within  the  old  lines,  and  to 
treat  separately  the  important  subjects  which  were 
omitted  in  that  scheme.  I  consider  therefore  that 
history  has  to  do  with  the  State,  that  it  investigates 
the  growth  and  changes  of  a  certain  corporate  society, 
which  acts  through  certain  functionaries  and  certain 
assemblies.  By  the  nature  of  the  State  every  person 
who  lives  in  a  certain  territory  is  usually  a  member 
of  it,  but  history  is  not  concerned  with  individuals 


8  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

except  in  their  capacity  of  members  of  a  State. 
That  a  man  in  England  makes  a  scientific  discovery 
or  paints  a  picture,  is  not  in  itself  an  event  in  the 
history  of  England.  Individuals  are  important  in 
history  in  proportion,  not  to  their  intrinsic  merit, 
but  to  their  relation  to  the  State.  Socrates  was  a 
much  greater  man  than  Cleon,  but  Cleon  has  a  much 
greater  space  in  Thucydides.  Newton  was  a  greater 
man  than  Harley,  yet  it  is  Harley,  not  Newton,  who 
fixes  the  attention  of  the  historian  of  the  reign  of 
Queen  Anne. 

After  this  explanation  you  will  see  that  the 
question  I  raised.  What  is  the  general  drift  or  goal 
of  English  history?  is  much  more  definite  than  it 
might  at  first  sight  appear.  I  am  not  thinking  of  any 
general  progress  that  the  human  race  everywhere 
alike,  and  therefore  also  in  England,  may  chance  to 
be  making,  nor  even  necessarily  of  any  progress 
peculiar  to  England.  By  England  I  mean  solely 
the  state  or  political  community  which  has  its  seat  in 
England.  Thus  strictly  limited,  the  question  may 
seem  to  you  perhaps  a  good  deal  less  interesting ; 
however  that  may  be,  it  certainly  becomes  much  more 
manageable. 

The  English  State  then,  in  what  direction  and 
towards  what  goal  has  that  been  advancing?  The 
words  which  jump  to  our  lips  in  answer  are  Liberty, 
Democracy  I  They  are  words  which  want  a  great 
deal  of  defining.  Liberty  has  of  course  been  a 
leading  characteristic  of  England  as  compared  with 
continental  countries,  but  in  the  main  liberty  is  not 


I  TENDENCY  IN  ENGLISH  HISTORY  9 

SO  much  an  end  to  which  we  have  been  tending  as 
a  possession  Avhich  we  have  long  enjoyed.  The 
struggles  of  the  seventeenth  century  secured  it — 
even  if  they  did  not  first  acquire  it — for  us.  In 
later  times  there  has  been  a  movement  towards 
something  which  is  often  called  liberty,  but  not  so 
correctly.  We  may,  if  we  like,  call  it  democracy ; 
and  I  suppose  the  current  opinion  is  that  if  any  large 
tendency  is  discernible  in  the  more  recent  part  of 
English  history,  it  is  this  tendency,  by  which  first 
the  middle  class  and  then  gradually  the  lower 
classes  have  been  admitted  to  a  share  of  influence  in 
public  aflfairs. 

Discernible  enough  no  doubt  this  tendency  is,  at 
least  in  the  nineteenth  century,  for  in  the  eighteenth 
century  only  the  first  beginnings  of  it  can  be  traced. 
It  strikes  our  attention  most,  because  it  has  made  for 
a  long  time  past  the  staple  of  political  talk  and 
controversy.  But  history  ought  to  look  at  things 
from  a  greater  distance  and  more  comprehensively. 
If  we  stand  aloof  a  little  and  follow  with  our  eyes 
the  progress  of  the  English  State,  the  great  governed 
society  of  English  people,  in  recent  centuries,  we 
shall  be  much  more  struck  by  another  change,  Avhich 
is  not  only  far  greater  but  even  more  conspicuous, 
though  it  has  always  been  less  discussed,  partly 
because  it  proceeded  more  gradually,  partly  because 
it  excited  less  opposition.  I  mean  the  simi^le  obvious 
fact  of  the  extension  of  the  English  name  into  other 
countries  of  the  globe,  the  foundation  of  Greater 
Britain. 


!   J 


10  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

There   is   something   very    characteristic    in   the 
indifference   which   we   show   towards  this    mighty 
phenomenon   of   the   diffusion   of  our  race  and  the 
expansion  of  our  state.     We  seem,  as  it  were,  to  have 
conquered  and   peopled  half   the  world   in  a  fit   of 
absence   of  mind.     While  we  were  doing   it,  that  is 
in  the  eighteenth  century,   we   did   not  allow  it  to 
affect  our  imaginations  or  in  any  degree  to  change  our 
ways  of  thinking ;  nor  have  we  even  now  ceased  to 
think   of   ourselves  as  simply  a  race  inhabiting   an 
island   off  the  northern  coast  of   the   Continent  of 
Europe.      We   constantly  betray   by  our   modes  of 
speech  that  we  do  not  reckon  our  colonies  as  really 
belonging   to  us;   thus  if   we   are  asked   what   the 
English  population  is,   it  does   not  occur  to  us   to 
reckon -in  the   population  of  Canada  and  Australia. 
This    fixed    way    of    thinking    has   influenced   our 
historians.     It  causes  them,  I  think,  to  miss  the  true 
point  of  view   in  describing  the  eighteenth  century. 
They  make   too   much   of   the   mere  parliamentary 
wrangle  and  the  agitations  about  liberty,  in  all  which 
matters  the  eighteenth  century  of  England  was  but  a 
pale   reflection   of   the   seventeenth.      They  do  not 
perceive  that  in  that  century  the  history  of  England 
is  not  in  England  but  in  America  and  Asia.     In  like 
manner  I  believe  that  when  we  look  at  the  present 
state  of  affairs,  and  still  more  at  the  future,  we  ought 
to   beware  of   putting   England  alone   in   the   fore- 
ground   and    suff"ering   what   we   call    the    English 
possessions  to  escape  our  view  in   the  background 
of  the  picture. 


I  TENDENCY  IN  ENGLISH  HISTORY  11 

Let  me  describe  ^vith  some  exactness  the  change 
that  has  taken  place.  In  the  last  years  of  Queen 
Elizabeth  England  had  absolutely  no  possessions 
outside  'Europe,  for  all  schemes  of  settlement,  from 
that  of  Hore  in  Henry  VIII. 's  reign  to  those  of 
Gilbert  and  Raleigh,  had  failed  alike.  Great  Britain 
did  not  yet  exist ;  Scotland  was  a  separate  kingdom, 
and  in  Ireland  the  English  were  but  a  colony  in  the 
midst  of  an  alien  population  still  in  the  tribal  stage. 
With  the  accession  of  the  Stuart  family  commenced 
at  the  same  time  two  processes,  one  of  which 
was  brought  to  completion  under  the  last  Stuart, 
Queen  Anne,  while  the  other  has  continued  without 
interruption  ever  since.  Of  these  the  first  is  the 
internal  union  of  the  three  kingdoms,  which,  though 
technically  it  was  not  completed  till  much  later,  may 
be  said  to  be  substantially  the  work  of  the  seven- 
teenth century  and  the  Stuart  dynasty.  The  second 
was  the  creation  of  a  still  larger  Britain  compre- 
hending vast  possessions  beyond  the  sea.  This 
process  began  with  the  first  Charter  given  to  Virginia 
in  1606.  It  made  a  great  advance  in  the  seventeenth 
century ;  but  not  till  the  eighteenth  did  Greater 
Britain  in  its  gigantic  dimensions  and  with  its  vast 
politics  first  stand  clearly  before  the  world.  Let  us 
consider  what  this  Greater  Britain  at  the  present  day 
precisely  is. 

Excluding  certain  small  possessions,  which  are 
chiefly  of  the  nature  of  naval  or  military  stations, 
it  consists  besides  the  United  Kingdom  of  four  great 
groups  of  territory,  inhabited  either  chiefly  or  to  a 


12  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect, 

large  extent  by  Englishmen  and  subject  to  the  Crown, 

and  a  fifth  great  territory  also  subject  to  the  Crown 
and  ruled  by  English  officials,  but  inhabited  by  a 
completely  foreign  race.  The  first  four  are  the 
Dominion  of  Canada,  the  West  Indian  Islands,  among 
which  I  include  some  territories  on  the  continent 
of  Central  and  Southern  America,  the  mass  of  South 
African  possessions  of  which  Cape  Colony  is  the  most 
considerable,  and  fourthly  the  Australian  group,  to 
which,  simply  for  convenience,  I  must  here  add  New 
Zealand.     The  dependency  is  India. 

Now  what  is  the  extent  and  value  of  these 
possessions  1  First  let  us  look  at  their  population, 
which,  the  territory  being  as  yet  newly  settled,  is  in 
many  cases  thin.  The  Dominion  of  Canada  with 
Newfoundland  had  in  1881  a  population  of  rather 
more  than  four  millions  and  a  half — that  is,  about 
equal  to  the  population  of  Sweden ;  the  West  Indian 
group  rather  more  than  a  million  and  a  half,  about 
equal  to  the  population  at  the  same  time  of  Greece ; 
the  South  African  group  about  a  million  and  three 
quarters,  but  of  these  much  less  than  a  half  are  of 
European  blood ;  the  Australian  group  about  three 
millions,  rather  more  than  the  population  of  Swit- 
zerland. This  makes  a  total  of  ten  millions  and 
three  quarters,  or  about  ten  millions  of  English 
subjects  of  European  and  mainly  English  blood 
outside  the  British  Islands. 

The  population  of  the  great  dependency  India  was 
nearly  a  hundred  and  ninety-eight  millions,  and  the 
native  states  in  India  which  look  up  to  England  aa 


I  TENDENCY  IN  ENGLISH  HISTORY  13 

the  paramount  Power  had  about  fifty-seven  millions 
in  addition.  The  total  makes  a  population  roughly 
equal  to  that  of  all  Europe  excluding  Russia. 

But  of  course  it  strikes  us  at  once  that  this 
enormous  Indian  population  does  not  make  part  of 
Greater  Britain  in  the  same  sense  as  those  ten 
millions  of  Englishmen  who  live  outside  of  the 
British  Islands.  The  latter  are  of  our  own  blood, 
and  are  therefore  united  with  us  by  the  strongest  tie. 
The  former  are  of  alien  race  and  religion,  and  are 
bound  to  us  only  by  the  tie  of  conquest.  It  may 
be  fairly  questioned  whether  the  possession  of  India 
does  or  ever  can  increase  our  power  or  our  security, 
while  there  is  no  doubt  that  it  vastly  increases  our 
dangers  and  responsibilities.  Our  colonial  Empire 
stands  on  quite  a  different  footing ;  it  has  some  of  the 
fundamental  conditions  of  stability.  There  are  in 
general  three  ties  by  which  states  are  held  together, 
community  of  race,  community  of  religion,  community 
of  interest.  By  the  first  two  our  colonies  are 
evidently  bound  to  us,  and  this  fact  by  itself  makes 
the  connection  strong.  It  will  grow  indissolubly  firm 
if  we  come  to  recognise  also  that  interest  bids  us 
maintain  the  connection,  and  this  conviction  seems  to 
gain  ground.  When  we  inquire  then  into  the 
Greater  Britain  of  the  future  we  ought  to  think 
much  more  of  our  Colonial  than  of  our  Indian 
Empire. 

This  is  an  important  consideration  when  we  come 
to  estimate  the  Empire  not  by  population  but  by 
territorial  area.     Ten  millions  of  Englishmen  beyond 


14  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

the  sea, — this  is  something;  but  it  is  absolutely 
nothing  compared  with  what  will  ultimately,  nay 
with  what  will  speedily,  be  seen.  For  those  millions 
are  scattered  over  an  enormous  area,  which  fills  up 
Avith  a  rapidity  quite  unlike  the  increase  of  population 
in  England.  That  you  may  measure  the  importance 
of  this  consideration,  I  give  you  one  fact.  The 
density  of  population  in  Great  Britain  is  two  hundred 
and  ninety-one  to  the  square  mile,  in  Canada  it  is  not 
much  more  than  one  to  the  square  mile.  Suppose 
for  a  moment  the  Dominion  of  Canada  peopled  as 
fully  as  Great  Britain,  its  population  would  actually 
be  more  than  a  thousand  millions.  That  state  of 
things  is  no  doubt  very  remote,  but  an  immense 
increase  is  not  remote.  In  not  much  more  than  half 
a  century  the  Englishmen  beyond  the  sea — supposing 
the  Empire  to  hold  together — will  be  equal  in  number 
to  the  Englishmen  at  home,  and  the  total  will  be 
much  more  than  a  hundred  millions. 

These  figures  may  perhaps  strike  you  as  rather 
overwhelming  than  interesting.  You  may  make  it 
a  question  whether  we  ought  to  be  glad  of  this  vast 
increase  of  our  race,  whether  it  would  not  be  better 
for  us  to  advance  morally  and  intellectually  than  in 
mere  population  and  possessions,  whether  the  great 
things  have  not  for  the  most  part  been  done  by  the 
small  nations,  and  so  on.  But  I  do  not  quote  these 
figures  in  order  to  gratify  our  national  pride.  I 
leave  it  an  open  question  whether  our  increase  ia 
matter  for  exultation  or  for  regret.  It  is  not  yet 
time  to  consider  that.     What  is  clear  in  the  mean- 


I  TENDENCY  IN  ENGLISH  HISTORY  15 

time  is  the  immense  importance  of  this  increase. 
Good  or  bad,  it  is  evidently  the  great  fact  of  modern 
English  history.  And  it  would  be  the  greatest 
mistake  to  imagine  that  it  is  a  merely  material  fact, 
or  that  it  carries  no  moral  and  intellectual  con- 
sequences. People  cannot  change  their  abodes,  pass 
from  an  island  to  a  continent,  from  the  50th  degree 
of  north  latitude  to  the  tropics  or  the  Southern 
Hemisphere,  from  an  ancient  community  to  a  new 
colony,  from  vast  manufacturing  cities  to  sugar 
plantations,  or  to  lonely  sheep-walks  in  countries 
where  aboriginal  savage  tribes  still  wander,  without 
changing  their  ideas  and  habits  and  ways  of  thinking, 
nay  without  somewhat  modifying  in  the  course  of 
a  few  generations  their  physical  type.  "We  know 
already  that  the  Canadian  and  the  Victorian  are  not 
quite  like  the  Englishman ;  do  we  suppose  then  that 
in  the  next  century,  if  the  colonial  population  has 
become  as  numerous  as  that  of  the  mother-country, 
assuming  that  the  connection  has  been  maintained  and 
has  become  closer,  England  itself  will  not  be  very 
much  modified  and  transformed  1  Whether  good  or 
bad  then,  the  growth  of  Greater  Britain  is  an  event  of 
enormous  magnitude. 

Evidently  as  regards  the  future  it  is  the  greatest 
event.  But  an  event  may  be  very  great,  and  yet  be 
so  simple  that  there  is  not  much  to  be  said  about  it, 
that  it  has  scarcely  any  history.  It  is  thus  that  the 
great  English  Exodus  is  commonly  regarded,  as  if  it 
had  happened  in  the  most  simple,  inevitable  manner, 
as  if  it  were  merely  the  unopposed  occupation  of 


16  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

empty  countries  by  the  nation  which  happened  to 
have  the  greatest  surplus  population  and  the  greatest 
maritime  power.  I  shall  show  this  to  be  a  great 
mistake.  I  shall  show  that  this  Exodus  makes  a 
most  ample  and  a  most  full  and  interesting  chapter 
in  English  history,  I  shall  venture  to  assert  that 
during  the  eighteenth  century  it  determines  the 
whole  course  of  affairs,  that  the  main  struggle  of 
England  from  the  time  of  Louis  XIV.  to  the  time  of 
Napoleon  was  for  the  possession  of  the  New  "World, 
and  that  it  is  for  want  of  perceiving  this  that  most 
of  us  find  that  century  of  English  history  unin- 
teresting. 

The  great  central  fact  in  this  chapter  of  history  is 
that  we  have  had  at  different  times  two  such  Empires. 
So  decided  is  the  drift  of  our  destiny  towards  the 
occupation  of  the  New  World  that  after  we  had 
created  one  Empire  and  lost  it,  a  second  grew  up 
almost  in  our  own  despite.  The  figures  I  gave  you 
refer  exclusively  to  our  second  Empire,  to  that 
which  we  still  possess.  When  I  spoke  of  the  ten 
millions  of  English  subjects  who  live  beyond  the  sea, 
I  did  not  pause  to  mention  that  a  hundred  years  ago 
we  had  another  set  of  colonies  which  had  already  a 
population  of  three  millions,  that  these  colonies  broke 
off  from  us  and  formed  a  federal  state,  of  which  the 
population  has  in  a  century  multiplied  more  than 
sixteenfold,  and  is  now  equal  to  that  of  the  mother 
country  and  its  colonies  taken  together.  It  is  an 
event  of  prodigious  magnitude,  not  only  that  this 
Empire  should  have  been  lost  to  us,  but  that  a  new 


I  TENDENCY  IN  ENGLISH  HISTORY  17 

state,  English  in  race  and  character,  should  have 
sprung  up,  and  that  this  state  should  have  grown  in 
a  century  to  be  greater  in  population  than  every 
European  state  except  Eussia.  But  the  loss  we 
suffered  in  the  secession  of  the  American  colonies  has 
left  in  the  English  mind  a  doubt,  a  misgiving,  which 
affects  our  whole  forecast  of  the  future  of  England. 

For  if  this  English  Exodus  has  been  the  greatest 
English  event  of  the  eighteenth  and  nineteenth 
centuries,  the  greatest  English  question  of  the  future 
must  be,  what  is  to  become  of  our  second  Empire,  and 
whether  or  no  it  may  be  expected  to  go  the  way  of 
the  first.  In  the  solution  of  this  question  lies  that 
moral  which  I  said  ought  to  result  from  the  study  of 
English  history. 

It  is  an  old  saying,  to  which  Turgot  gave 
utterance  a  quarter  of  a  century  before  the  De- 
claration of  Independence,  "  Colonies  are  like  fruits 
which  cling  to  the  tree  only  till  they  ripen."  He 
added,  "  As  soon  as  America  can  take  care  of  herself, 
she  will  do  what  Carthage  did."  What  wonder  that 
when  this  prediction  was  so  signally  fulfilled,  the 
proposition  from  which  it  had  been  deduced  rose, 
especially  in  the  minds  of  the  English,  to  the  rank  of 
a  demonstrated  principle !  This  no  doubt  is  the 
reason  why  we  have  regarded  the  growth  of  a  second 
Empire  with  very  little  interest  or  satisfaction. 
"What  matters,"  we  have  said,  "its  vastness  or  its 
rapid  growth  1  It  does  not  grow  for  us."  And  to 
the  notion  that  we  cannot  keep  it  we  have  added  the 
notion  that  we  need  not  wish  to  keep  it,  because, 
c 


18  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

with  that  curious  kind  of  optimistic  fatalism  to 
which  historians  are  liable,  the  historians  of  our 
American  war  have  generally  felt  bound  to  make  out 
that  the  loss  of  our  colonies  was  not  only  inevitable, 
but  was  even  a  fortunate  thing  for  us. 

Whether  these  views  are  sound,  I  do  not  inquire 
now.     I  merely  point  out  that  two  alternatives  are 
before  us,  and  that  the  question,  incomparably  the 
greatest  question  which  we  can  discuss,  refers  to  the 
choice  between  them.     The  four  groups  of  colonies 
may  become  four  independent  states,  and  in  that  case 
two  of  them,  the  Dominion  of  Canada  and  the  West 
Indian   group,  will   have  to  consider  the    question 
whether  admission  into  the  United  States  will  not  be 
better  for  them  than  independence.     In  any  case  the 
English  name  and  English  institutions  will  have  a 
vast    predominance   in    the    New   World,   and    the 
separation   may  be    so   managed  that  the   mother- 
country  may  continue  always  to  be  regarded  with 
friendly   feelings.     Such   a   separation  would   leave 
England  on  the  same  level  as  the  states  nearest  to  us 
on  the  Continent,  populous,  but  less  so  than  Germany 
and  scarcely  equal  to  France.     But  two  states,  Russia 
and  the  United  States,  would  be  on  an  altogether 
higher  scale  of  magnitude,  Russia  having  at  once, 
and  the  United  States  perhaps  before  very  long,  twice 
our  population.     Our  trade  too  would  be  exposed  to 
wholly  new  risks. 

The  other  alternative  is,  that  England  may  prove 

'  able  to  do  what  the  United  States  does  so  easily, 

that  is,  hold  together  in  a  federal  union  countries 


I  TENDENCY  IN  ENGLISH  HISTOEY  19 

very  remote  from  each  other.  In  that  case  England 
■will  take  rank  with  Russia  and  the  United  States  in 
the  first  rank  of  state,  measured  hy  population  and 
area,  and  in  a  higher  rank  than  the  states  of  the 
Continent.  We  ought  by  no  means  to  take  for 
granted  that  this  is  desirable.  Bigness  is  not 
necessarily  greatness ;  if  by  remaining  in  the  second 
rank  of  magnitude  we  can  hold  the  first  rank  morally 
and  intellectually,  let  us  sacrifice  mere  material 
magnitude.  But  though  we  must  not  prejudge  the 
question  whether  we  ought  to  retain  our  Empire,  we 
may  fairly  assume  that  it  is  desirable  after  due 
consideration  to  judge  it. 

With  a  view  to  forming  such  a  judgment,  I 
propose  in  these  lectures  to  examine  historically  the 
tendency  to  expansion  which  England  has  so  long 
displayed.  We  shall  learn  to  think  of  it  more 
seriously  if  we  discover  it  to  be  profound,  persistent, 
necessary  to  the  national  life,  and  more  hopefully  if 
we  can  satisfy  ourselves  that  the  secession  of  our 
first  colonies  was  not  a  mere  normal  result  of  ex- 
pansion, like  the  bursting  of  a  bubble,  but  the  result 
■  of  temporary  conditions,  removable  and  which  have 
been  removed. 


LECTUEE  II 

ENGLAND   IN  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY 

It  was  in  the  eighteenth  century  that  the  expansion 
of  England  advanced  most  rapidly.  If  therefore  we 
would  understand  the  nature  of  that  expansion,  and 
measure  how  much  it  absorbed  of  the  energy  and 
vitality  of  the  nation,  we  cannot  do  better  than 
consult  the  records  of  the  eighteenth  century.  Those 
records  too,  if  I  mistake  not,  will  acquire  new 
interest  from  being  regarded  from  this  point  of 
view. 

I  constantly  remark,  both  in  our  popular  histories 
and  in  occasional  allusions  to  the  eighteenth  century, 
what  a  faint  and  confused  impression  that  period  has 
left  upon  the  national  memory.  In  a  great  part  of 
it  we  see  nothing  but  stagnation.  The  wars  seem  to 
lead  to  nothing,  and  we  do  "not  perceive  the  working 
of  any  new  political  ideas.  That  time  seems  to  have 
created  little,  so  that  we  can  only  think  of  it  as  pros- 
perous, but  not  as  memorable.  Those  dim  figures 
George  I.  and  George  II.,  the  long  tame  administra- 


LECT.  II    ENGLAND  IN  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTUKY     21 

tions  of  Walpole  and  Pelham,  the  commercial  war 
with  Spain,  the  battles  of  Dettingen  and  Fontenoy, 
the  foolish  Prime  Minister  Newcastle,  the  dull  brawls 
of  the  Wilkes  period,  the  miserable  American  war ; — 
everywhere  alike  we  seem  to  remark  a  want  of  great- 
ness, a  distressing  commonness  and  flatness  in  men 
and  in  affairs.  But  what  we  chiefly  miss  is  unity. 
In  France  the  corresponding  period  has  just  as  little 
greatness,  but  it  has  unity  ;  it  is  intelligible ;  we  can 
describe  it  in  one  word  as  the  age  of  the  approach  of 
the  Eevolution.  But  what  is  the  English  eighteenth 
century,  and  what  has  come  of  it?  What  was  ap- 
proaching then  1 

But  do  we  take  the  right  way  to  discover  the  unity 
of  a  historical  period  1 

We  have  an  unfortunate  habit  of  distributing 
historical  afiairs  under  reigns.  We  do  this  mechanic- 
ally, as  it  were,  even  in  periods  where  we  recognise, 
nay,  where  we  exaggerate,  the  insignificance  of  the 
monarch.  The  first  Georges  were,  in  my  opinion,  by 
no  means  so  insignificant  as  is  often  supposed,  but 
even  the  most  influential  sovereign  has  seldom  a 
right  to  give  his  name  to  an  age.  Much  miscon- 
ception, for  example,  has  arisen  out  of  the  expression. 
Age  of  Louis  XIV.  The  first  step  then  in  arranging 
and  dividing  any  period  of  English  history  is  to  get 
rid  of  such  useless  headings  as  Keign  of  Queen  Anne, 
Reign  of  George  I.,  Reign  of  George  II.  In  place  of 
these  we  must  study  to  put  divisions  founded  upon 
some  real  stage  of  progress  in  the  national  life.  We 
must  look  onward  not  from  king  to  king,  but  from 


22  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leoT. 

great  event  to  great  event.  And  in  order  to  do  this 
we  must  estimate  events,  measure  their  greatness ;  a 
thing  which  cannot  be  done  without  considering  them 
and  analysing  them  closely.  When  with  respect  to 
any  event  we  have  satisfied  ourselves  that  it  deserves 
to  rank  among  the  leading  events  of  the  national 
history,  the  next  step  is  to  trace  the  causes  by  which 
it  was  produced.  In  this  way  each  event  takes  the 
character  of  a  development,  and  each  development 
of  this  kind  furnishes  a  chapter  to  the  national 
history,  a  chapter  which  will  get  its  name  from  the 
event. 

For  a  plain  example  of  the  principle  take  the  reign 
of  George  III.  What  can  be  more  absurd  than  to 
treat  this  long  period  of  sixty  years  as  if  it  had  any 
historical  unity,  simply  because  one  man  was  king 
during  the  whole  of  iti  What  then  are  we  to 
substitute  for  the  king  as  a  principle  of  division  1 
Evidently  great  events.  One  part  of  the  reign  will 
make  a  chapter  by  itself  as  the  period  of  the  loss  of 
America,  another  as  that  of  the  struggle  with  the 
French  Revolution. 

But  in  a  national  history  there  are  large  as  well  as 
smaller  divisions.  Besides  chapters  there  are,  as  it 
were,  books  or  parts.  This  is  because  the  great 
events,  when  examined  closely,  are  seen  to  be  con- 
nected with  each  other;  those  which  are  chrono- 
logically nearest  to  each  other  are  seen  to  be  similar ; 
they  fall  into  groups,  each  of  which  may  be  regarded 
as  a  single  complex  event,  and  the  complex  events 
give  their  names  to  the  parts,  as  the  simpler  events 


II  ENGLAND  IN  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTUKT  23 

give  their  names  to  the  separate  chapters,  of  the 
history. 

In  some  periods  of  history  this  process  is  so  easy 
that  we  perform  it  almost  unconsciously.  The  events 
bear  their  significance  written  on  their  face,  and  the 
connection  of  events  is  also  obvious.  When  you  read 
the  reign  of  Louis  XV.  of  France,  you  feel  without 
waiting  to  reason  that  you  are  reading  of  the  fall  of 
the  French  Monarchy.  But  in  other  parts  of  history 
the  clue  is  less  easy  to  find,  and  it  is  here  that  we  feel 
that  embarrassment  and  want  of  interest  which,  as  I 
have  said.  Englishmen  are  conscious  of  when  they  look 
back  upon  their  eighteenth  century.  In  most  cases 
of  this  kind  the  fault  is  in  the  reader ;  he  would  be 
interested  in  the  period  if  he  had  the  clue  to  it,  and 
he  would  find  the  clue  if  he  sought  it  deliberately. 

We  are  to  look  then  at  the  great  events  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  examine  each  to  see  its  precise 
significance,  and  compare  them  together  with  a  view 
to  discovering  any  general  tendency  there  may  be. 
I  speak  roughly  of  course  when  I  say  the  eighteenth 
century.  More  precisely  I  mean  the  period  which 
begins  with  the  Revolution  of  1688  and  ends  with 
the  peace  of  1815.  Now  what  are  the  great  events 
during  this  period?  There  are  no  revolutions.  In 
the  way  of  internal  disturbance  all  that  we  find  is 
two  abortive  Jacobite  insurrections  in  1715  and 
1745.  There  is  a  change  of  dynasty,  and  one  of  an 
unusual  kind,  but  it  is  accomplished  peacefully  by  Act 
of  Parliament.  The  great  events  are  all  of  one  sort, 
they  are  foreign  wars. 


24  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

These  wars  are  on  a  much  larger  scale  than  any 
which  England  had  waged  before,  since  the  Hundred 
Years'  War  of  the  fourteenth  and  fifteenth  centuries. 
They  are  also  of  a  more  formal  business-like  kind 
than  earlier  wars.  For  England  has  now  for  the  first 
\l  time  a  standing  army  and  navy.  The  great  English 
navy  first  took  definite  shape  in  the  wars  of  the 
Commonwealth,  and  the  English  Army,  founded  on 
the  Mutiny  Bill,  dates  from  the  reign  of  William  III. 
Between  the  Kevolution  and  the  Battle  of  Waterloo 
it  may  be  reckoned  that  we  waged  seven  great  wars, 
of  which  the  shortest  lasted  seven  years  and  the 
longest  about  twelve.  Out  of  a  hundred  and  twenty- 
six  years,  sixty-four  years,  or  more  than  half,  were 
spent  in  war. 

That  these  wars  were  on  a  greater  scale  than  any 
which  had  preceded,  may  be  estimated  by  the  burden 
which  they  laid  upon  the  country.  Before  this 
period  England  had  of  course  often  been  at  war ;  still 
at  the  commencement  of  it  England  had  no  consider- 
able debt — her  debt  was  less  than  a  million — but  at 
the  end  of  this  period,  in  1817,  her  debt  amounted 
to  eight  hundred  and  forty  millions.  And  you  are 
to  beware  of  taking  even  this  large  amount  as 
measuring  the  expensiveness  of  the  wars.  Eight 
hundred  and  forty  millions  was  not  the  cost  of  the 
wars;  it  was  only  that  part  of  the  cost  which  the 
nation  could  not  meet  at  once;  but  an  enormous 
amount  had  been  paid  at  once.  And  yet  this  debt 
alone,  contracted  in  a  period  of  a  hundred  and 
twenty  years,  is  equivalent  to  seven  millions  a  year 


II    ENGLAND  IN  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTUKY    25 

spent  on  war  during  the  whole  time,  while  for  a  good 
part  of  the  eighteenth  century  the  whole  annual  cost 
of  government  did  not  exceed  seven  millions. 

This  series  of  great  wars  is  evidently  the 
characteristic  feature  of  the  period,  for  not  only  dof;s 
it  begin  with  this  period,  but  also  appears  to  end 
with  it.  Since  1815  we  have  had  local  wars  in  India 
and  some  of  our  colonies,  but  of  struggles  against 
great  European  Powers,  such  as  this  period  saw  seven 
times,  we  have  only  seen  one  in  a  period  more  than 
half  as  long,  and  it  lasted  but  two  years. 

Let  us  pass  these  wars  in  review.  There  was  first 
the  European  war  in  which  England  was  involved 
by  the  Eevolution  of  1688.  It  is  pretty  well 
remembered,  since  the  story  of  it  has  been  told  by 
Macaulay.  It  lasted  eight  years,  from  1689  to  1697. 
There  was  then  the  great  war  called  from  the 
Spanish  Succession,  which  we  shall  always  remember, 
because  it  was  the  war  of  Marlborough's  victories. 
It  lasted  eleven  years,  from  1702  to  1713.  The  ^2 
next  great  war  has  now  passed  almost  entirely  out  of 
memory,  not  having  brought  to  light  any  very  great 
commander,  nor  achieved  any  definite  result.  But 
we  have  all  heard  speak  of  the  fable  of  Jenkins'  ears, 
and  we  have  heard  of  the  battles  of  Dettingcn  and 
Fontenoy,  though  perhaps  few  of  us  could  give  a 
rational  account  either  of  the  reason  for  fighting  them  ^ 
or  of  the  result  that  came  of  them.  And  yet  this 
war  too  lasted  nine  years,  from  1739  to  1748.  Next  /  "r 
comes  the  Seven  Years'  War,  in  which  we  have  not 
forgotten  the  victories  of  Frederick.     In  the  English 


1^ 


/ 


26  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

part  of  it  we  all  remember  one  grand  incident,  the 
battle  of  the  Heights  of  Abraham,  the  death  of 
Wolfe,  and  the  conquest  of  Canada.  And  yet  in  the 
case  of  this  war  also  it  may  be  observed  how  much 
the  eighteenth  century  has  faded  out  of  our  imagin- 
ations. We  have  quite  forgotten  that  that  victory 
was  one  of  a  long  series,  which  to  contemporaries 
seemed  fabulous,  so  that  the  nation  came  out  of  the 
struggle  intoxicated  with  glory,  and  England  stood 
upon  a  pinnacle  of  greatness  which  she  had  never 
reached  before.  We  have  forgotten  how,  through  all 
that  remained  of  the  eighteenth  century,  the  nation 
looked  back  upon  those  two  or  three  splendid  years  ^ 
as  upon  a  happiness  that  could  never  return,  and 
how  long  it  continued  to  be  the  unique  boast  of  the 
Englishman 

That  Chatham's  language  was  his  mother-tongue 
And  Wolfe's  great  heart  compatriot  with  his  own. 

This  is  the  fourth  war.  It  is  in  sharp  contrast  with 
the  fifth,  which  we  have  tacitly  agreed  to  mention  as 
seldom  as  we  can.  What  we  call  the  American  war, 
which  from  the  first  outbreak  of  hostilities  to  the 
Peace  of  Paris  lasted  eight  years,  from  1775  to  1783, 

^  Mark  how  the  unenthusiastic  "Walpole  writes  of  them : 
"  Intrigues  of  the  Cabinet  or  of  Parliament  scarcely  existed  at  that 
period.  All  men  were,  or  seemed  to  be,  transported  with  the 
success  of  their  country,  and  content  with  an  Administration  which 
outwent  their  warmest  wishes  or  made  their  jealousy  ashamed  to 
show  itself.  One  episode  indeed  there  was,  in  which  less  heroic 
aifections  were  concerned  ...  it  will  diversify  the  story,  and  by 
the  intermixture  of  human  passions  serve  to  convince  posterity 
that  such  a  display  of  immortal  actions  as  illustrate  the  following 
pages  is  not  the  exhibition  of  a  fabulous  age." 


II  ENGLAND  IN  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY  27 

was  indeed  ignominious  enough  in  America,  but  iu 
its  latter  part  it  spread  into  a  grand  naval  war,  in 
which  England  stood  at  bay  against  almost  all  the 
world,  and  in  this,  through  the  victories  of  Eodney, 
we  came  off  with  some  credit.  The  sixth  and  seventh 
are  the  two  great  wars  with  Revolutionary  France, 
which  we  are  not  likely  to  forget,  though  we  ought 
to  keep  them  more  separate  in  our  minds  than  we  do. 
The  first  lasted  nine  years  from  1793  to  1802,  the 
second  twelve,  from  1803  to  1815. 

Now  probably  it  has  occurred  to  few  of  us  to 
connect  these  wars  together,  or  to  look  for  any  unity 
of  plan  or  purpose  pervading  them.  If  such  a 
thought  did  occur,  we  should  probably  find  ourselves 
hopelessly  baffled  in  our  first  attempts.  In  one  war 
the  question  appears  to  be  of  the  method  of  suc- 
cession to  the  CroAvn  of  Spain,  in  another  war  of  the 
Austrian  succession  and  of  the  succession  to  the 
Empire.  But  if  there  seems  so  far  some  resemblance, 
what  have  these  succession  questions  to  do  with  the 
right  of  search  claimed  by  the  Spaniards  along 
the  Spanish  Main,  or  the  limits  of  Acadie,  or  the 
principles  of  the  French  Revolution?  And  as  the 
grounds  of  quarrel  seem  quite  accidental,  so  we  are 
bewildered  by  the  straggling  haphazard  character  of 
the  wars  themselves.  Hostilities  may  break  out  in 
the  Low  Countries  or  in  the  heart  of  Germany,  but 
the  war  is  waged,  so  it  seems,  anywhere  or  every- 
where, at  Madras,  or  at  the  mouth  of  the  St, 
Lawrence,  or  on  the  banks  of  the  Ohio.  Thus 
Macaulay  says  in  speaking  of  Frederick's  invasion  of 


28.  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

Silesia,  "  In  order  that  he  might  rob  a  neighbour 
whom  he  had  promised  to  defend,  black  men  fought 
on  the  coast  of  Coromandel  and  red  men  scalped  each 
other  by  the  Great  Lakes  of  North  America."  On  a 
first  survey  such  is  the  confused  appearance  which 
these  wars  present. 

But  look  a  little  closer,  and  after  all  you  will 
discover  some  uniformities.  For  example,  out  of 
these  seven  wars  of  England  five  are  wars  with 
France  from  the  beginning,  and  both  the  other  two, 
though  the  belligerent  at  the  outset  was  in  the  first 
Spain  and  in  the  second  our  own  colonies,  yet  became 
in  a  short  time  and  ended  as  wars  with  France. 

Now  here  is  one  of  those  general  facts  which  we 
are  in  search  of.  The  full  magnitude  of  it  is  not 
usually  perceived,  because  the  whole  middle  part  of 
the  eighteenth  century  has  passed  too  much  into 
oblivion.  We  have  not  forgotten  that  there  were 
two  great  wars  with  France  just  about  the  junction 
of  the  eighteenth  and  nineteenth  centuries,  and  two 
other  great  wars  with  France  about  the  junction  of 
the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth,  but  we  have  half 
forgotten  that  near  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth 
century  there  Avas  another  great  war  of  England  and 
France,  and  that,  as  prelude  and  afterpiece  to  this 
war,  there  was  a  war  with  Spain  which  turned  into  a 
war  with  France,  and  a  war  with  America  which 
turned  into  a  war  with  France.  The  truth  is,  these 
wars  group  themselves  very  symmetrically,  and  the 
whole  period  stands  out  as  an  age  of  ^^aiitio  rivalry_ 
between   England   and    France,    a  kind   of    second 


n         ENGLAND  IN  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY         29 

Hundred  Years'  War.  In  fact  in  those  times  and 
down  to  our  own  memory  the  eternal  discord  of 
England  and  France  appeared  so  much  a  law  of 
nature  that  it  was  seldom  spoken  of.  The  wars  of 
their  own  times,  blending  with  a  vague  recollection 
of  Cr^cy,  Poictiers  and  Agincourt,  created  an  im- 
pression in  the  minds  of  those  generations,  that 
England  and  France  always  had  been  at  war  and  \y 
always  would  be.  But  this  was  a  pure  illusion.  In^ 
the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries  England 
and  France  had  not  been  these  persistent  enemies. 
The  two  states  had  often  been  in  alliance  against 
Spain.  In  the  seventeenth  century  an  Anglo-French 
Alliance  had  been  almost  the  rule.  Elizabeth  and 
Henri  IV.  are  allies,  Charles  I.  has  a  French  queen, 
Cromwell  acts  in  concert  with  Mazarin,  Charles  II. 
and  James  II.  make  themselves  dependent  upon 
Louis  XIV. 

But  may  not  this  frequent  recurrence  of  war  with 
France  have  been  a  mere  accident,  arising  from  the 
nearness  of  France  and  the  necessary  frequency  of 
collisions  with  her  %  On  examination  you  will  find 
that  it  is  not  merely  accidental,  but  that  these  wars 
are  connected  together  in  internal  causation  as  well 
as  in  time.  It  is  rather  the  occasional  cessation  of 
war  that  is  accidental ;  the  recurrence  is  natural  and 
inevitable.  There  is  indeed  one  long  truce  of  twenty - 
seven  years  after  the  Peace  of  Utrecht ;  this  was  the 
natural  effect  of  the  exhaustion  in  which  all  Europe 
was  left  by  the  war  of  the  Spanish  Succession,  a  war 
almost  as  great  in  comparison  with  the  then  magnitude 


30  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LECT. 

of  the  European  states  as  the  great  struggle  with 
Napoleon.     But  when  this  truce  was  over  we  may 
almost  regard  all  the  wars  which  followed  as  con- 
stituting one  war  interrupted  by  occasional  pauses. 
'At  any  rate  the  three  wars  between  1740  and  1783, 
those   commonly   called  the   War   of   the   Austrian 
Succession,  the  Seven  Years'  War  and  the  American 
War,  are,  so  far  as  they  are  wars  of  England  and 
France,  intimately  connected  together,  and  form  as  it 
were  a  trilogy  of  wars.     I  call  your  attention  par- 
ticularly to  this,  because  this  group  of  wars,  considered 
as  one  great  event  with  a  single  great  object  and 
result,   supplies  just  the  grand   feature  which  that 
time  seems  so  sadly  to  want.     It  is  only  our  own 
blindness  and  perversity  which  leads  us  to  overlook 
the  grandeur  of  that   phase   in   our  history,    while 
we  fix   our  eyes  upon   petty  domestic  occurrences, 
parliamentary   quarrels,    party   intrigue,   and   court- 
gossip.     It  so  happens  that  the  accession  of  George 
III.  falls  in  the  middle  of  this  period,  and  seems  to 
us,  in  consequence  of  our  childish  mode  of  arranging 
history,  to  create  a  division,  where  there  is  no  real 
division,  but  rather  unusually  manifest  continuity. 
And   as   in    parliamentary   and   party   politics    the 
accession  of  George  III.  really  did  make  a  consider- 
able epoch,  and  the  temptation  of  our  historians  is 
always  to  write  the  history  rather  of  the  Parliament 
than  of  the  State  and  nation,  a  false  scent  misleads 
us  here,  and  we  remain  quite  blind  to  one  of  the 
grandest  and  most  memorable  turning-points  in  our 
history,     I   say   these   wars  make   one   grand_^nd 


II  ENGLAND  IN  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CEIJTURY  31 

decisive^ struggle  between  England  and  France.  For 
look  at  the  facts.  Nominally  the  first  of  these  three 
wars  was  ended  by  the  Treaty  of  Aix-la-Chapelle  in 
1748.  Nominally  there  followed  eight  years  of  peace 
between  England  and  France.  But  really  it  was  not 
so  at  all.  Whatever  virtue  the  treaty  of  Aix-la- 
Chapelle  may  have  had  towards  settling  the  quarrels 
of  the  other  European  Powers  concerned  in  the  war, 
it  scarcely  interrupted  for  a  moment  the  conflict 
between  England  and  France.  It  scarcely  even 
appeared  to  do  so,  for  the  great  question  of  the 
boundary  of  the  English  and  French  settlements  in 
America,  of  the  limits  of  Acadie  and  Canada,  was 
disputed  with  just  as  much  heat  after  the  Treaty  as 
before  it.  And  not  in  words  only  but  by  arms,  just 
as  much  as  if  war  were  still  going  on.  Moreover, 
what  I  remark  of  the  American  frontier  is  equally 
true  of  another  frontier,  along  which  at  that  time  the 
English  and  French  met  each  other,  namely  in  India. 
It  is  a  remarkable,  little-noticed  fact  that  some  of  the 
most  memorable  encounters  between  the  English  and 
the  French  which  have  ever  taken  place  in  the  course 
of  their  long  rivalry,  some  of  the  classic  occurrences 
of  our  military  history,  took  place  in  these  eight  years 
when  nominally  England  and  France  were  at  peace. 
We  have  all  heard  how  the  French  built  Fort 
Duquesne  on  the  Ohio  River,  how  our  colony  of 
Virginia  sent  a  body  of  400  men  under  the  command 
of  George  Washington,  then  a  very  young  man  and 
a  British  subject,  to  attack  it,  and  how  Washington 
was  surrounded  and  forced  to  capitulate.     We  have 


32  ,    EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

heard  too  of  the  defeat  and  death  of  General  Braddock 
in  the  same  parts.  Still  better  do  we  remember  the 
struggle  between  Dupleix  and  Clive  in  India,  the 
defence  of  Arcot  and  the  deeds  which  led  to  the 
founding  of  our  Indian  Empire.  All  these  events 
were  part  of  a  desperate  struggle  for  supremacy 
~/^"  between  England  and  France,  but  you  will  find  that 
most  of  them  took  place  after  the  Treaty  of  Aix-la- 
Chapelle  in  1748  and  before  the  commencement  of 
the  second  war  in  1756. 

We  have  then  one  great  conflict  lasting  from  1744 
or  a  little  earlier  to  the  Peace  of  Paris  in  1763 
through  a  period  of  about  twenty  years.  It  ended 
in  the  most  disastrous  defeat  that  has  ever,  in  modern 
times,  been  suffered  by  France  except  in  1870,  a 
defeat  which  in  fact  sealed  the  fate  of  the  House  of 
Bourbon.  But  fifteen  years  later,  and  just  within  the 
lifetime  of  the  great  statesman  who  had  guided  us  to 
victory,  England  and  France  were  at  war  again. 
France  entered  into  relations  with  our  insurgent 
colonies,  acknowledged  their  independence,  and  as- 
sisted them  with  troops.  Once  more  for  five  years 
there  was  Avar  by  land  and  sea  between  England  and 
France.  But  are  we  to  suppose  that  this  was  a 
wholly  new  war,  and  not  rather  a  sort  of  after-swell 
of  the  great  disturbance  that  had  so  recently  been 
stilled?  It  was  not  for  a  moment  dissembled  that 
France  now  in  our  hour  of  distress  took  vengeance  for 
what  she  had  suffered  from  us.  This  was  her  revenge 
for  the  loss  of  Canada,  namely,  to  create  the  United 
States.      In   the   words   which  on   a  later   occasion 


tl  ENGLAND  IN  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY  33 

became  so  celebrated,  she  "  called  a  new  world  into 
existence  to  redress  the  balance  of  the  old." 

Thus  these  three  great  wars  are  more  clearly 
connected  together  than  they  might  appear  to  be. 
But  how  closely  connected  they  are  we  shall  not  see 
until  we  ask  ourselves  what  the  ground  of  quarrel 
was,  and  whether  the  same  gi-ound  of  quarrel  runs 
under  all  of  them.  At  first  sight  it  appears  to  be 
other^vise.  For  the  war  of  England  and  France  does  ■ 
not  at  any  time  stand,  out  distinct  and  isolated,  but  ,'  ^ 
is  mixed  up  with  other  wars  which  are  going  on  at  ) 
the  same  time.  Such  immense  complex  medleys  are 
characteristic  of  the  eighteenth  century.  What,  for 
instance,  can  the  capture  of  Quebec  have  to  do  with 
the  struggle  of  Frederick  and  Maria  Theresa  for 
Silesia  ?  In  such  medleys  there  is  great  room  for 
historical  mistakes,  for  premature  generalisation. 
What  is  really  at  issue  may  be  misunderstood ;  as  for 
instance,  when  we  remark  that  in  the  Seven  Years' 
War  all  the  Protestant  Powers  of  Europe  were 
ranged  on  one  side,  we  should  go  very  far  astray  if 
we  tried  to  make  out  that  it  was  Protestantism  that 
prevailed  in  India  or  in  Canada  over  the  spirit  of 
Catholicism. 

I  said  that  the  expansion  of  England  in  the  New 
World  and  in  Asia  is  the  formula  which  sums  up  for 
England  the  history  of  the  eighteenth  century.  I 
point  out  now  that  the  great  triple  war  of  the  middle 
of  that  century  is  neither  more  nor  less  than  the^  / 
great  decisive  duel  between  England  and  France  for  i  ^ 
the   possession  of   the  New  World.     It   was  perhaps  / 


34  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

scarcely  perceived  at  the  time,  as  it  has  been  seldom 
remarked  since ;  but  the  explanation  of  that  second 
Hundred  Years'  War  between  England  and  France 
which  fills  the  eighteenth  century  is  this,  that  they 
were  rival  candidates  for  the  possession  of  the  New 
World,  and  the  triple  war  which  fills  the  middle  of 
the  century  is,  as  it  were,  the  decisive  campaign  in 
that  great  world-struggle. 
~-     We  did   not  take  possession  of    North   America 
simply  because  we  found   it  empty  and  had  more 
ships  than  other  nations  by  which  we  might  carry 
colonists  into  it.     Not  indeed  that  we  conquered  it 
^    ';     from  another  Power  which  already  had  possession  of 
j    it.      But   we   had    a    competitor  in    the   work    of 
I    settlement,  a  competitor  who  in  some  respects  had 
1   got  the  start  of  us,  namely  France. 
L    The  simple  fact  about  North  America  is  this,  that 
about    the   same   time   that    James   I.    was  giving 
charters  to  Virginia  and  New  England  the  French 
were  founding  farther  North  the  two  settlements  of 
Acadie  and  Canada,  and  again,  about  the  time  that 
William  Penn  got  his  Charter  for  Pennsylvania  from 
Charles  II.,  the  Frenchman  La  Salle,  by  one  of  the 
greatest  feats  of  discovery,  made  his  way  from  the 
Great  Lakes  to  the  sources  of  the  Mississippi,  and 
putting  his  boats  upon  the   stream   descended   the 
whole  vast  river  to  the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  laying  open 
a  great    territory,    which    immediately    afterwards 
became  the  French  colony  of  Louisiana.     Such  was 
the  relation  of  France  and  England  in  North  America, 
at  the  time  when  the   Revolution  of    1688   opened 


II         ENGLAND  IN  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY  35 

what  I  have  called  the  Second  Hundred  Years'  War  ) 
of  England  and  France.  England  had  a  row  of 
thriving  colonies  l3ang  from  North  to  South  along  the 
Eastern  coast,  but  France  had  the  two  great  rivers, 
the  St.  Lawrence  and  the  Mississippi.  A  political 
prophet  comparing  the  prospects  of  the  two  colon- 
ising Powers  at  the  time  of  the  Revolution,  and 
indeed  much  later,  might  have  been  led  by  observing 
what  an  advantage  the  two  rivers  gave  to  France  to 
think  that  in  the  future  North  America  would  belong 
to  her  rather  than  to  England.  _  . 

But  now  it  is  most  important  to  observe  further  » 
that  not  only  in  America,  but  in  Asia  also,  France 
and  England  in  that  age  advanced  side  by  side. 
The  conquest  of  India  by  English  merchants  seems  a 
unique  and  abnormal  phenomenon,  but  we  should  be 
mistaken  if  we  supposed  that  there  was  anything 
peculiarly  English,  either  in  the  originality  which 
conceived  the  idea  or  in  the  energy  which  carried  it 
into  execution.  So  far  as  an  idea  of  conquering 
India  was  deliberately  conceived,  it  was  conceived  bvj 
Frenchmen;  Frenchmen  first  perceived  that  it  was 
feasible  and  saw  the  manner  in  which  it  could  be 
done ;  Frenchmen  first  set  about  it  and  advanced 
some  way  towards  accomplishing  it.  In  India  indeed 
they  had  the  start  of  us  much  more  decidedly  than 
in  North  America ;  in  India  we  had  at  the  outset  a 
sense  of  inferiority  in  comparison  with  them,  and 
fouglit  in  a  spirit  of  hopeless  self-defence.  And  I 
find,  when  I  study  the  English  conquest  of  India, 
that  we  were  actuated  neither  by  ambition  nor  yet 


36  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

by  mere  desire  to  advance  our  trade,  but  that  from 
first  to  last — that  is,  from  the  first  efforts  of  Clive  to 
the  time  when  Lord  Wellesley,  Lord  Minto  and 
Lord  Hastings  established  our  authority  over  the 
whole  vast  peninsula — we  were  actuated  by  fear  of  the 
French.  Behind  every  movement  of  the  native 
Powers  we  saw  French  intrigue,  French  gold,  French 
ambition,  and  never,  until  we  were  masters  of  the 
whole  country,  got  rid  of  that  feeling  that  the  French 
were  driving  us  out  of  it,  which  had  descended  from 
the  days  of  Dupleix  and  Labourdonnais. 

This  fact  then  that,  both  in  America  and  in  Asia, 
France  and  England  stood  in  direct  competition  for 
a  prize  of  absolutely  incalculable  value,  explains  the 
fact  that  France  and  England  fought  a  second 
Hundred  Years'  War.  This  is  the  ultimate  ex- 
planation, but  the  true  ground  of  discord  was  not 
always  equally  apparent  even  to  the  belligerents 
themselves,  and  still  less  to  the  rest  of  the  world. 
For  as  in  other  ages  so  in  this,  occasional  causes  of 
difference  frequently  arose  between  such  near  neigh- 
bours, causes  often  sufficient  by  themselves  to  produce 
a  war ;  and  it  was  only  in  those  three  wars  of  the 
middle  of  the  eighteenth  century  that  they  fought 
quite  visibly  and  apparently  on  the  question  of  the 
New  World.  In  the  earlier  wars  of  William  HI  and 
of  Anne  other  causes  are  more,  or  certainly  not  less, 
operative,  for  the  New  World  quarrel  is  not  yet  at 
its  height.  And  again  in  the  later  wars,  tliat  is  the 
two  that  followed  the  French  Revolution,  the  question 
of  the  New  World  is  again  falling  into  the  back- 


II  ENGLAND  IN  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY  37 

ground,  because  France  has  fairly  lost  her  hold  both 
upon  America  and  India,  and  can  now  do  no  more 
than  make  despairing  efforts  to  regain  it.  But  in] 
those  three  wars  between  1740  and  1783  the  struggle, 
as  between  England  and  France,  is  entirely  for  the 
New  World.  In  the  first  of  them  the  issue  is  fairly 
joined ;  in  the  second  France  suffers  her  fatal  fall ;  in 
the  third  she  takes  her  signal  revenge.  This  is  the 
grand  chapter  in  the  history  of  Greater  Britain,  for  it 
is  the  first  gi'eat  struggle  in  which  the  Empire  fights 
as  a  whole,  the  colonies  and  settlements  outside 
Europe  being  here  not  merely  dragged  in  the  wake 
of  the  mother-country,  but  actually  taking  the  lead. 
We  ought  to  register  this  event  with  a  very  broad 
mark  in  our  Calendar  of  the  eighteenth  century. 
The  principal  and  most  decisive  incidents  of  it  belong 
to  the  latter  half  of  the  reign  of  George  II. 

But  in  our  wars  with  Louis  XIV.  before  and  in 
our  wars  with  the  French  Eevolution  afterwards,  it 
will  be  found  on  examination  that,  much  more  than 
might  be  supposed,  the  real  bone  of  contention 
between  England  and  France  is  the  New  World.^ 
The  colonial  question  had  indeed  been  growing  in 
magnitude  throughout  the  seventeenth  century,  while 
the  other  burning  question  of  that  age,  the  quarrel  of 
the  two  Churches,  had  been  falling  somewhat  into 
the  background.  Thus  when  Cromwell  made  war  on 
Spain,  it  is  a  question  whether  he  attacked  her  as 
the  great  Catholic  PoAver  or  as  the  great  monopolist 
of  the  New  World.  In  the  same  age  the  two  great 
Protestant  Powers,  England  and  Holland,  who  ought 


38  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

in  the  interest  of  religion  to  have  stood  side  by  side, 
are  found  waging  furious  war  upon  each  other  as 
rival  colonial  Powers.  Now  it  was  by  the  great 
discovery  and  settlement  of  Louisiana  in  1683  that 
France  was  brought  into  the  forefront  of  colonial 
Powers,  and  within  six  years  of  that  event  the 
/Hundred  Years'  War  of  England  and  France  began. 
In  the  first  war  of  the  series  however,  though  it 
stands  marked  in  histories  of  North  America  as  the 
"first  intercolonial  war,"  the  colonial  question  is  not 
very  prominent.  But  it  is  prominent  in  the  second, 
which  has  been  called  the  War  of  the  Spanish  Suc- 
cession. We  must  not  be  misled  by  this  name. 
Much  has  been  said  of  the  wicked  waste  of  blood  and 
treasure  of  which  we  were  guilty,  when  we  inter- 
fered in  a  Spanish  question  with  which  we  had  no 
concern,  or  terrified  ourselves  with  a  phantom  of 
French  Ascendency  which  had  no  reality.  How 
much  better,  it  has  been  said,  to  devote  ourselves  to 
the  civilising  pursuits  of  trade !  But  read  in  Ranke  ^ 
how  the  war  broke  out.  You  will  find  that  it  was 
precisely  trade  that  led  us  into  it.  The  Spanish 
Succession  touched  us  because  France  threatened,  by 
establishing  her  influence  in  Spain,  to  enter  into  the 
Spanish  monopoly  of  the  New  World  and  to  shut  us 
irrevocably  out  of  it.  Accordingly  the  great  practical 
results  of  this  war  to  England  were  colonial,  namely, 
the  conquest    of  Acadie   and  the  Asicnto   contract, 

*  Better  still  in  Europdische  Oeschichte  im  \%ten  Jahrhunderte, 
by  C.  V.  Noonlen,  in  wliicli  book  that  great  European  transition 
ia  for  the  first  time  adequately  treated. 


II  ENGLAND  IN  THE  EIGHTEENTH  GENTUKY  39 

which  for  the  first  time  made  England  on  the  great 
scale  a  slave-trading  Power. 

Not  less  true  is  it  of  our  wars  with  the 
French  Revolution  and  with  Napoleon,  that  the 
possession  of  the  New  World  was  among  the  grounds 
of  quarrel.  As  in  the  American  war  France  avenges 
on  England  her  expulsion  from  the  New  World,  so 
under  Napoleon  she  makes  Titanic  efforts  to  recover 
her  lost  place  there.  This  indeed  is  Napoleon's  fixed  \ 
view  with  regard  to  England.  He  sees  in  England 
never  the  island,  the  European  State,  but  always  the 
World  -  Empire,  the  network  of  dependencies  and 
colonies  and  islands  covering  every  sea,  among  which 
he  was  himself  destined  to  find  at  last  his  prison  and 
his  grave.  Thus  when  in  1798  he  was  put  in  charge 
for  the  first  time  of  the  war  with  England,  he  begins 
by  examining  the  British  Channel,  and  no  doubt 
glances  at  Ireland.  But  what  he  sees  does  not 
tempt  him,  although  a  few  months  afterward  Ireland 
broke  out  in  a  terrible  rebellion,  during  which  if  the 
conqueror  of  Italy  had  suddenly  landed  at  the  head 
of  a  French  army,  undoubtedly  he  would  have  struck 
a  heavier  blow  at  England  than  any  she  has  yet 
suffered.  His  mind  is  preoccupied  with  other 
thoughts.  He  remembers  how  France  once  seemed 
on  the  point  of  conquering  India,  until  England  ^ 
checked  her  progress ;  accordingly  he  decides  and 
convinces  the  Directory  that  the  best  way  to  carry  on 


^  In  liis  Corsica!!  period  lie  had  actually  dicained  of  entering 
the  Anglo-Indian  service  and  coining  back  a  rich  nabob.  See 
Jung,  Lricien  Bonapa/rte  et  ses  Memoi/res  1.  p.  74. 


40  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

the  contest  with  England  is  by  occupying  Egypt, 
and  at  the  same  time  by  stirring  up  Tippoo  Sultan 
to  war  with  the  Calcutta  Government.  And  he 
actually  carries  out  this  plan,  so  that  the  whole 
struggle  is  transferred  from  the  British  Channel  into 
the  boundless  spaces  of  Greater  Britain,  and  when 
the  Irish  shortly  afterwards  rise,  ihey  find  to  their 
bitter  disappointment  that  France  cannot  spare  them 
Bonaparte,  but  only  General  Humbert  with  eleven 
i    hundred  men. 

When  this  war  was  brought  to  an  end  by  the 
treaty  of  Amiens  in  1802,  the  results  of  it  were  such 
as  to  make  a  great  epoch  in  the  history  of  Greater 
Britain.  In  the  first  place  Egypt  is  finally  evacuated 
by  France,  that  is  to  say,  Bonaparte's  grand  scheme 
of  attack  against  our  Indian  Empire  has  failed,  his 
ally  Tippoo — Citoyen  Tipou,  as  he  was  called — had 
been  defeated  and  slain  some  time  before,  and  General 
Baird  had  moved  with  an  English  force  up  the  Ked 
Sea  to  take  part  with  General  Hutchinson  in  the 
expulsion  of  the  French  from  Egypt.  In  the  colonial 
world  at  the  same  time  England  remained  mistress  of 
Ceylon  and  Trinidad. 

But  the  last  war,  that  which  lasted  from  1803  to 
1815,  was  this  in  any  sense  a  war  for  the  New 
World  1  It  does  not  seem  to  be  so ;  and  naturally, 
because  England  from  the  beginning  had  such  a  naval 
superiority,  that  Napoleon  could  never  again  succeed  in 
making  his  way  back  into  the  New  World.  Never- 
theless I  believe  that  it  was  intended  by  Napoleon 
to  be  so.     In  the  first  place  look  at  the  origin  and 


a  ENGLAND  IN  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY  41 

cause  of  it.  It  was  at  the  outset  a  war  for  Malta, 
By  the  treaty  of  Amiens,  England  had  engaged  with- 
in a  given  time  to  evacuate  Malta,  and  this  for 
certain  reasons,  which  need  not  here  be  discussed,  she 
afterwards  refused  to  do.  Now  why  did  Napoleon 
want  her  to  leave  Malta,  and  why  did  she  refuse  to 
do  so  ■?  It  was  because  Malta  was  the  key  of  Egypt, 
and  she  had  good  reason  to  believe  that  he  would  in 
a  moment  reoccupy  Egypt,  and  that  the  struggle  for 
India  would  begin  again.  Thus  the  war  was  ulti- 
mately for  India,  though  it  was  diverted  into 
Germany  by  the  Third  Coalition.  Moreover,  though 
by  the  retention  of  Malta  we  did  effectually  and  once 
for  all  ward  off  this  attack,  yet  we  did  not  ourselves 
know  how  successful  we  had  been.  We  still  believed 
India  to  be  full  of  French  intrigue  ;  we  believed  the 
Mahratta  and  Afghan  princes  and  the  Persian  Shah 
to  be  puppets  worked  by  the  French,  as  indeed  they 
had  many  French  officers  in  their  service.  Probably 
the  great  Mahratta  War  of  1803  seemed  to  Lord 
Wellesley  to  be  a  part  of  the  war  with  France,  and 
probably  Arthur  Wellesley  believed  that  at  Assaye 
and  Argaum  he  struck  at  the  same  enemy  as  after- 
wards at  Salamanca  and  Waterloo.  The  fact  is  that 
Napoleon's  intention  in  this  war  is  obscured  to  us  by 
the  grand  failure  of  the  maritime  enterprise  which  he 
has  planned,  and  the  grand  success  of  the  German 
campaign  which  he  has  not  planned.  He  drifts  in  a 
direction  he  does  not  intend,  yet  the  Continental  Sj'stem 
and  the  violent  seizure  of  Spain  and  Portugal  (great 
New  World  Powers)  show  that  he  does  not  forget  his 


42  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LECT. 

original  object.  Moreover,  Colonel  Malleson  shows 
in  his  Later  Struggles  of  France  in  the  East,  what  a 
destructive  privateering  war  the  French  were  able  to 
keep  up  in  the  Indian  Ocean  from  their  island  of 
Mauritius  long  after  their  naval  power  had  been 
destroyed  at  Trafalgar.  It  was  by  the  conquest  of 
this  island  and  its  retention  at  the  Peace  by  England 
that  the  Hundred  Years'  War  of  England  and  France 
for  the  New  World  came  to  an  end. 

This  general  view  of  the  wars  of  the  eighteenth 
century  will  show  you  that  more  is  meant  than  might 
at  first  appear  by  the  statement  that  expansion  is  the 
chief  character  of  English  history  in  the  eighteenth 
century.  At  first  it  seems  merely  to  mean  that  the 
conquest  of  Canada,  India  and  South  Africa  are 
greater  events  in  intrinsic  importance  than  such 
European  or  domestic  events  as  Marlborough's  war, 
or  the  succession  of  the  House  of  Brunswick,  or  the 
Jacobite  rebellion,  or  even  the  war  with  the  French 
Revolution.  It  means  in  fact,  as  you  will  now  see, 
that  these  other  great  events  which  seem  to  have 
nothing  to  do  with  the  growth  of  Greater  Britain, 
were  really  closely  connected  with  it,  and  were 
indeed  only  successive  moments  in  the  great  process. 
At  first  it  may  seem  to  mean  that  the  European 
policy  of  England  in  that  century  is  of  less  impor^ 
ance  than  its  colonial  policy.  It  really  means  that 
the  European  policy  and  the  colonial  policy  are  but 
different  aspects  of  the  same  great  national  develop- 
ment. And  this,  nay  even  more  than  this,  is  what 
I   desire   to  show.     This    single   conception   brings 


II  ENGLAND  IN  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY  43 

together  not  only  the  European  with  the  colonial 
affairs,  but  also  the  military  struggles  with  the  whole 
peaceful  expansion  of  the  country,  with  that  indus-  ^ 
trial  and  commercial  growth,  which  during  the  same 
century  exceeded  in  England  all  previous  example. 
But  in  order  to  understand  this  it  will  be  necessary 
for  us  to  examine  the  peculiar  nature  of  the  English 
colonisation  of  the  New  World. 


LECTURE    III 

THE   EMPIRE 

The  expression  "  Colonial  Empire  "  is  familiar  to  us, 
and  yet  there  is  something  strange  in  the  juxtaposition 
of  words.  The  word  Empire  seems  too  military  and 
despotic  to  suit  the  relation  of  a  mother-country  to 
colonies. 

There  are  two  very  different  kinds  of  colonisation. 
First  there  is  a  kind  which  may  be  called  natural,  in 
the  sense  that  it  has  manifest  analogies  in  the  natural 
world.  "Colonies  are  like  fruits  which  only  cling 
till  they  ripen,"  said  Turgot.  Colonisation,  say 
others,  is  like  the  swarming  of  bees ;  or  it  is  like  the 
marriage  and  migration  to  another  house  of  the 
grown-up  son.  And  no  doubt  history  furnishes  us 
with  real  examples  of  such  easy  and  natural  colonisa- 
tion. The  primitive  migrations  may  often  have  been 
of  this  kind.  In  the  first  chapters  of  European 
history,  in  the  earliest  traditions  of  Greece  and  Italy, 
which  show  us  the  Greco-Italian  branch  of  the  Aryan 
family  in  the  act  of  occupying  the  territory  which 


LECT.  in  THE  EMPIRE  45 

was  afterwards  to  be  the  scene  of  its  greatness,  we 
see  this  easy  process  going  on  under  the  influence  of 
primitive  ideas.  We  read  of  the  institution  called 
ver  sacrum,  by  which  all  the  children  born  in  one 
spring  would  be  dedicated  to  some  deity,  who  was 
supposed  to  accept  emigration  in  lieu  of  sacrifice ;  ^ 
the  votaries  accordingly,  when  they  grew  up,  were  ■ 
driven  across  the  frontier,  and  sometimes  they 
settled  and  founded  a  city  on  the  spot  where  an 
animal  accidentally  overtaken  on  the  journey,  in 
whom  they  saw  a  guide  sent  by  the  god,  had  chanced 
to  stop.  From  such  a  sacred  animal  we  are  told  that 
some  cities,  e.g.  Bovianum  and  Picenum,  received 
their  name. 

This  may  be  called  perhaps  natural  colonisation, 
but  out  of  such  a  system  there  could  grow  no  colonial 
empire.  Accordingly  the  Greek  airoiKia,  though 
the  word  is  translated  colony,  was  essentially  different 
in  fact  from  the  modern  colony.  By  a  colony  we 
understand  a  community  which  is  not  merely  deriva- 
tive, but  which  remains  politically  connected  in  a 
relation  of  dependence  with  the  parent  community. 
Now  the  Greek  airoiKLa  was  not  such  a  dependent 
community.  Technically  it  was  entirely  independent 
of  the  mother  -  state,  though  the  sense  of  kindred 
commonly  held  it  in  a  condition  of  permanent  alliance. 
The  dependency  indeed  was  by  no  means  unknown 

^  Thus  Paulus :  Magnis  periculis  adducti  vovehant  Itali 
quaecunque  proximo  vere  nata  essent  apud  se  auinialia  immo- 
laturos.  Sed  quom  crudele  videretur  piieros  ac  puellas  innocentes 
interficere,  perductos  in  adultam  aetatem  velabaut  atque  ita  extra 
fiues  suos  ezieebaot. 


46  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect 

to  the  Greeks.  Subordinate  governments  "were  often 
among  them  established  by  a  State  in  a  community 
outside  itself.  But  among  the  Greeks  the  dependency 
was  not  a  colony,  as  the  colony  was  not  a  de- 
pendency. 

The  Latin  colonia  was  no  doubt  dependent  enough, 
but  it  was  an  institution  so  peculiar,  being  a  sort  of 
contrivance  for  the  purpose  of  garrisoning  conquered 
territory  without  the  expense  of  maintaining  an 
army  in  it,  that  we  need  not  discuss  it  further  here. 

It  is  a  remarkable  and  fundamental  fact  that  the 
old  primitive  system  of  the  Greeks  has  not  been 
revived  in  modern  times.  The  colonisation  which 
began  with  the  discovery  of  Columbus,  or  more 
strictly  with  the  conquest  of  the  Canaries  by  Bethen- 
court  in  1404,  has  been  on  a  vast  scale ;  it  has 
peopled  a  territory  more  extensive  a  hundredfold 
than  the  few  Mediterranean  islands  and  peninsulas 
which  those  primitive  Greek  adventurers  occupied, 
yet  nowhere,  I  think,  did  the  mother-state  willingly 
allow  its  emigrants  to  form  independent  communities. 
Whatever  license  might  be  allowed  to  the  first 
adventurers,  to  a  Cortez  or  Pizarro,  Avhatever  formid- 
able powers  of  levying  armies  and  making  war  or 
peace  might  be  granted,  for  example,  to  our  East 
India  Company,  the  State  nevertheless  retained 
invariably  the  supreme  control  in  its  hands,  except 
where  a  successful  rebellion  forced  it  out  of  them. 
Though  it  seems  not  to  have  occurred  to  Corinth 
that  it  could  possibly  carry  on  government  at  the 
distance  of  Sicily,  on  the  other  hand  it  seems  just  as 


Ill  THE  EMPIKE  47 

little  to  have  occurred  to  the  Spanish  or  Portuguese 
or  Dutch  or  French  or  English  Governments  that 
their  emigrants  could  pretend  to  independence  on 
the  ground  that  they  were  hidden  away  in  the 
Pampas  of  South  America  or  in  the  Archipelagos  of 
the  Pacific  Ocean. 

The  modern  system  may  be  less  natural  if  by 
"  natural "  we  mean  "  instinctive,"  but  if  we  mean  by 
it  "  reasonable,"  which  is  surely  different,  we  must  not 
call  it  unnatural  simply  because  it  is  not  the  system 
of  bees  or  of  plants.  At  any  rate  let  us  not  take  up 
at  once  the  scolding  strain,  and  say,  "  See  the  con- 
trast between  the  humane  wisdom  of  the  ancient 
world  and  the  tyranny  of  the  Gothic  Middle  Ages ! 
The  Goth  never  relaxes  for  any  distance  his  barbar- 
ous system  of  constraint ;  the  mild  intelligent  Greek, 
guided  by  nature,  perceives  that  the  grown-up  child 
has  a  right  to  be  independent,  and  so  he  blesses  him 
and  bids  him  farewell." 

Perhaps  if  we  examine  the  circumstances  of  the 
modern  colonisation  we  shall  see  that  it  grew 
as  inevitably  out  of  them  as  the  instinctive  system 
grew  out  of  the  conditions  of  the  ancient  world. 

The  appropriation  by  a  settled  community  of  lands 
on  the  other  side  of  an  ocean  is  wholly  different  from 
the  gradual  diffusion  of  a  race  over  a  continuous 
territory  or  across  narrow  seas.  Slight  motives 
calling  into  operation  moderate  forces  may  suffice  for 
the  latter,  but  the  former  demands  a  prodigious 
leverage.  In  the  life  of  Colombus  it  may  be  re- 
marked that  he  needs  the  help  of  the  State  at  every 


48  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

turn.  It  is  the  State  which  has  equipped  him  and  paid 
the  expense  of  the  discovery.  Moreover  when  the 
discovery  is  made,  it  is  observable  that  no  irresistible 
impulse  prompts  the  Europeans  to  take  advantage  of 
it.  When  the  floodgates  are  thrown  open,  there  is 
no  stream  ready  to  flow,  for  in  Europe  at  that  time 
there  was  no  superfluous  population  seeking  an  outlet, 
only  individual  adventurers  ready  to  go  in  search  of 
gold.  Columbus  can  make  no  progress  but  by 
proving  to  the  Sovereigns  that  the  territory  he  dis- 
covers will  yield  revenue  to  them.  In  these  circum- 
stances the  State,  as  its  help  was  always  needed,  had 
the  less  difficulty  in  maintaining  its  authority. 

We  may  observe  also  that  the  modern  State  almost 
necessarily  colonises  in  a  difi'erent  way,  because  its 
nature  is  different  from  that  of  the  Greek  State.  The 
Greek  mind  identifies  the  State  and  City  so  completely 
that  the  language,  as  you  know,  has  but  one  word  for 
both.  Aristotle,  though  he  knew  of  country-states 
such  as  Macedonia  and  Persia,  yet  in  his  Politics 
seems  almost  to  omit  them  from  consideration.  Fre- 
quently he  lays  down  principles  from  which  it  appears 
that  he  could  not  bring  himself  to  regard  them  as 
states  in  the  proper  sense  of  the  word,  because  they 
were  not  cities.  The  modern  idea  on  the  other  hand 
— few  of  us  know  how  modern  it  is,  or  how  gi-adually 
it  has  been  formed — is  that  the  people  of  one  nation, 
speaking  one  language,  ought  in  general  to  have  one 
government. 

Now  it  is  evident  that  these  difi'erent  ideas  of  the 
State  involve  of  necessity  different  ideas  of  the  effect 


in  THE  EMPIRE  49 

of  emigration.  If  the  State  is  the  City,  it  follows 
that  he  who  goes  out  of  the  City  goes  out  of  the 
State.  Hence  the  Greek  view  of  the  colony  was 
natural  to  the  Greeks,  for  those  Greeks  who  under- 
took to  form  a  new  city  (7roXt9,)  did  ipso  facto  and 
inevitably  undertake  to  form  a  new  state.  But  if  the 
State  is  the  Nation  (not  the  Country,  observe,  but  the 
Nation),  then  we  see  a  sufficient  ground  for  the 
universal  usage  of  modern  states,  which  has  been  to 
regard  their  emigrants  not  as  going  out  of  the  State 
but  as  carrying  the  State  with  them.  The  notion  was, 
WTiere  Englishmen  are  there  is  England,  where  French- 
men are  there  is  France,  and  so  the  possessions  of 
France  in  North  America  were  called  New  France, 
and  one  group  at  least  of  the  English  possessions  New 
England. 

It  is  involved  in  this,  but  it  is  so  important  that  it 
must  be  stated  separately,  that  the  organisation  of  the 
modern  State  admits  of  unbounded  territorial  ex- 
tension, while  that  of  the  ancient  State  did  not.  The 
Greek  iroXi'i,  as  it  actually  was  a  city,  could  not  be 
modified  so  as  to  become  anything  else.  I  must 
never  be  tired  of  quoting  that  passage  of  the  Politics 
which  is  so  infinitely  important  to  the  student  of 
political  science,  where  Aristotle  lays  it  doAvn  that 
the  State  must  be  of  moderate  population,  because 
"  who  could  command  it  in  war,  if  the  population  were 
excessive,  or  what  herald  short  of  a  Stentor  could  speak 
to  them^  (ti9  8e  Krjpv^  firj  ^revropeto^  ;)."  The 
modern  State,  being  already  as  large  as  a  country, 
would  bear  to  become  larger.  Either  it  had  no 
s 


50  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lbct. 

national  assemblies,  as  was  practically  the  case  with 
France  and  Spain,  or  its  national  assembly,  as  in 
the  case  of  England,  was  representative — that  is  to 
say,  was  expressly  contrived  to  overcome  the  diffi- 
culty of  bringing  together  the  whole  body  of  the 
citizens. 

I  have  indulged  in  these  general  reflections  upon 
the  nature  of  modern  colonisation  in  order  that  we 
may  understand  what  our  Empire  is,  and  how  it 
necessarily  came  into  existence.  There  might  easily 
have  been  a  great  emigration  from  England  which 
would  not  in  any  way  have  enlarged  the  English 
State.  For  by  Greater  Britain  we  mean  an  enlarge- 
ment of  the  English  State,  and  not  simply  of  the 
English  nationality.  It  is  not  simply  that  a  popula- 
tion of  English  blood  is  now  found  in  Canada  and  in 
Australia,  as  in  old  time  a  Greek  population  was 
spread  over  Sicily,  South  Italy  and  the  Western 
Coast  of  Asia  Minor.  That  was  an  extension  of  the 
Nationality  but  not  of  the  State,  an  extension  which 
gave  no  new  strength,  and  did  not  in  any  way  help 
the  Greek  name  when  it  was  attacked  and  conquered 
from  Macedonia.  In  like  manner  at  present  we  see 
a  constant  stream  of  emigration  from  Germany  to 
America,  but  no  Greater  Germany  comes  into  exist- 
ence, because  these  emigrants,  though  they  carry 
with  them  and  may  perhaps  not  altogether  lose  their 
language  and  their  ideas,  do  not  carry  with  them 
their  State.  This  is  the  case  with  Germany  because 
its  emigration  has  happened  too  late,  when  the  New 
World  is  already  carved  into  States,  into  which  its 


Ill  THE  EMPIRE  51 

emigrants  are  compelled  to  enter,  as  with  Greece  it 
was  the  result  of  a  theory  of  the  State,  which  identi- 
fied it  with  the  City.  But  Greater  Britain  is  a  real 
enlargement  of  the  English  State;  it  carries  across 
the  seas  not  merely  the  English  race,  but  the 
authority  of  the  English  Government.  We  call  it  for 
want  of  a  better  word  an  Empire.  And  it  does  re- 
semble the  great  Empires  of  history  in  this  respect, 
that  it  is  an  aggregate  of  provinces,  each  of  which  has 
a  government  sent  out  to  it  from  the  political  head- 
quarters, which  is  a  kind  of  delegation  from  the 
supreme  government.  But  yet  it  is  wholly  unlike 
the  great  Empires  of  the  Old  World,  Persian  or 
Macedonian  or  Roman  or  Turkish,  because  it  is  not 
in  the  main  founded  on  conquest,  and  because  in  the 
main  the  inhabitants  of  the  distant  provinces  are  of 
the  same  nation  as  those  of  the  dominant  country. 
It  resembles  them  in  its  vast  extent,  but  it  does  not 
resemble  them  in  that  violent  military  character 
which  has  made  most  Empires  short-lived  and  liable 
to  speedy  decay. 

We  may  see  now  out  of  what  conditions  it  arose. 
It  is  the  only  considerable  survivor  of  a  family  of 
great  Empires,  which  arose  out  of  the  contact  of  the 
Western  States  of  Europe  with  the  New  World  so 
suddenly  laid  open  by  Vasco  da  Gama  and  Columbus. 
What  England  did,  was  done  equally  by  Spain, 
Portugal,  France  and  Holland.  There  was  once  a 
Greater  Spain,  a  Greater  Portugal,  a  Greater  France 
and  a  Greater  Holland,  as  well  as  a  Greater  Britain, 
but  from   various  causes   those  four   Empires    have 


52  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lkct. 

either  perished  or  have  become  insignificant.  Greater 
Spain  disappeared  and  Greater  Portugal  lost  its 
largest  province  Brazil  half  a  century  ago  in  wars  of 
independence  similar  to  that  which  tore  from  us  our 
American  colonies.  Greater  France  and  a  large  part 
of  Greater  Holland  were  lost  in  war  and  became 
merged  in  Greater  Britain.  Greater  Britain  itself 
after  suffering  one  severe  shock  has  survived  to  the 
present  day,  and  remains  the  single  monument  of  a 
state  of  the  world  which  has  almost  passed  away. 
At  the  same  time  it  differs  in  a  very  essential  point 
from  some  of  those  Empires. 

The  countries  which  were  suddenly  thrown  open 
to  Europe  at  the  end  of  the  fifteenth  century  fall  into 
three  classes.  Vasco  da  Gama  threw  open  countries 
in  which  for  the  most  part  ancient  and  extensive 
states  existed,  such  as  the  adventurers  did  not  for  a 
long  time  think  of  subverting.  Columbus  on  the 
other  hand  discovered  a  Continent  in  which  only  two 
such  states  appeared  to  exist,  and  even  these  were 
soon  proved  to  have  no  solidity.  The  contact  which 
Columbus  established,  being  the  most  strange  and 
violent  which  ever  took  place  between  two  parts  of 
the  human  family,  led  to  a  fierce  struggle  and  furnished 
one  of  the  most  terrible  pages  to  the  annals  of  the  world. 
But  in  this  struggle  there  was  no  sort  of  equality. 
The  American  race  had  no  more  power  of  resisting 
the  European  than  the  sheep  has  of  resisting  the 
wolf.  Even  where  it  was  numerous  and  had  a  settled 
polity,  as  in  Peru,  it  could  make  no  resistance ;  its 
states  were  crushed,  the  ruling  families  extinguished, 


Ill  THE  EMPIRE  53 

and  the  population  itself  reduced  to  a  form  of  slavery. 
Everywhere  therefore  the  country  fell  into  the  hands 
of  the  immigrating  race,  and  was  disposed  of  at  its 
pleasure  as  so  much  plunder.  The  immigrants  did 
not  merely,  as  in  India,  gradually  show  a  great 
military  superiority  to  the  native  race,  so  as  in  the  end 
to  subdue  them,  but  overwhelmed  them  at  once  like 
a  party  of  hunters  suddenly  assailing  a  herd  of 
antelopes.  This  was  the  case  everywhere,  but  yet 
the  countries  of  America  also  fall  into  two  classes. 
There  was  a  great  difference  between  the  regions  of 
Central  and  Southern  America,  which  fell  principally 
to  the  Spanish  and  Portuguese,  and  the  North 
American  territories,  which  fell  to  England.  In 
Mexico,  Peru  and  some  other  parts  of  South  America 
the  native  population,  though  feeble  compared  to  the 
Europeans,  was  not  insignificant  in  numbers  ;  it  was 
counted  by  millions,  had  reached  the  agricultural 
stage  of  civilisation,  and  had  cities.  But  the  tribes 
of  Indians  which  wandered  over  the  territories  of 
North  America,  which  noAv  belong  to  the  United 
States  and  the  Dominion  of  Canada,  were  much 
more  insignificant.  It  has  been  estimated  that  "  the 
total  Indian  population  within  the  territory  of  the 
United  States  east  of  the  Rocky  Mountains,  did  not 
at  any  time  subsequent  to  the  discovery  of  America 
exceed,  if  indeed  it  even  reached,  three  hundred 
thousand  individuals."  Accordingly,  whereas  in  New 
Spain  the  European,  though  supreme,  yet  lived  in  the 
midst  of  a  population  of  native  Indians,  the  European  in 
North  America  supplanted  the  native  race  entirely, 


54  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

pushed  it  ever  farther  back  as  he  advanced,  and  did 
not  blend  with  it  at  all. 

It  was  ultimately  the  fortune  of  England  to  ac- 
quire the  most  important  share  both  of  what  Vasco 
da  Gama  and  of  what  Columbus  laid  open.  On  one 
side  has  grown  up  her  Indian,  and  mainly  on  the 
other  her  Colonial  Empire.  But  of  the  latter  group 
of  countries,  the  countries  wanting  in  strong  states, 
England  occupied  those  which  were  comparatively 
empty,  and  the  Australian  territory  which  has  since 
fallen  to  her  is  in  the  same  condition.  This  fact  has 
an  all-important  consequence. 

I  remarked  before  that  Greater  Britain  is  an  ex- 
tension of  the  English  State  and  not  merely  of  the 
English  nationality.  But  it  is  an  equally  striking 
characteristic  of  Greater  Britain  that  nevertheless  it 
is  an  extension  of  the  English  nationality.  When  a 
nationality  is  extended  without  any  extension  of  the 
State,  as  in  the  case  of  the  Greek  colonies,  there  may 
be  an  increase  of  moral  and  intellectual  influence,  but 
there  is  no  increase  of  political  power.  On  the  other 
hand,  when  the  State  advances  beyond  the  limits  of 
the  nationality,  its  power  becomes  precarious  and 
artificial.  This  is  the  condition  of  most  empires ;  it 
is  the  condition  for  example  of  our  own  empire  in 
India.  The  English  State  is  powerful  there,  but  the 
English  nation  is  but  an  imperceptible  drop  in  the 
ocean  of  an  Asiatic  population.  And  when  a  nation 
extends  itself  into  other  territories  the  chances  are 
that  it  will  there  meet  with  other  nationalities  which 
it  cannot  destroy  or  completely  drive  out,  even  if  it 


in  THE  EMPIRE  56 

succeeds  in  conquering  them.  When  this  happens, 
it  has  a  great  and  permanent  difficulty  to  contend 
with.  The  subject  or  rival  nationalities  cannot  be 
perfectly  assimilated,  and  remain  as  a  permanent 
cause  of  weakness  and  danger.  It  has  been  the  for- 
tune of  England  in  extending  itself  to  evade  on  the 
whole  this  danger.  For  it  has  occupied  parts  of  the 
globe  which  were  so  empty  that  they  offered  an  un- 
bounded scope  for  new  settlement.  There  was  land 
for  every  emigrant  who  chose  to  come,  and  the  native 
races  were  not  in  a  condition  sufficiently  advanced  to 
withstand  even  the  peaceful  competition,  much  less 
the  power,  of  the  immigrants. 

This  statement  is  true  on  the  whole.  The  English 
Empire  is  on  the  whole  free  from  that  weakness  which 
has  brought  down  most  empires,  the  weakness  of  being 
a  mere  mechanical  forced  union  of  alien  nationalities. 
It  is  sometimes  described  as  an  essentially  feeble 
union  which  could  not  bear  the  slightest  shock,  with 
what  reason  I  may  examine  later,  but  it  has  the 
fundamental  strength  which  most  empires  and  some 
commonwealths  want.  Austria  for  instance  is  divided 
by  the  nationality-rivalry  of  German,  Slav,  and  Mag- 
yar ;  the  Swiss  Confederation  unites  three  languages, 
but  the  English  Empire  in  the  main  and  broadly  may 
be  said  to  be  English  throughout. 

Of  course,  however,  considerable  abatements  are  to 
be  made.  It  is  only  in  one  of  the  four  great  groups, 
namely,  in  the  Australian  colonies,  that  the  statement 
is  true  almost  without  qualification.  The  native 
Australian  race  is  so  low  in   the  ethnological  scale 


56  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LEOT. 

that  it  can  never  give  the  least  trouble,  but  even 
here,  since  we  reckon  New  Zealand  in  this  group,  we 
are  to  bear  in  mind  that  the  Maori  tribes  occupy  the 
Northern  island  in  some  force,  much  as  in  the  last 
century  the  Highland  Clans  gave  us  trouble  in  the 
northern  part  of  our  own  island,  and  the  Maori  is  by 
no  means  a  contemptible  type  of  man.  Nevertheless 
the  whole  number  of  Maories  is  not  supposed  to 
exceed  forty  thousand,  and  it  is  rapidly  diminishing. 
When  we  turn  to  another  group,  the  North  American 
colonies,  included  principally  in  the  Dominion  of 
Canada,  we  find  that  the  nucleus  of  it  was  acquired 
originally,  not  by  English  settlement,  but  by  the  con- 
quest of  French  settlements.  At  the  outset  therefore 
the  nationality-difficulty,  instead  of  being  absent  here, 
was  present  in  the  gravest  form.  The  original  Canada 
of  the  French  was  afterwards  known  as  Lower  Canada, 
and  since  the  establishment  of  the  Dominion  it  has 
borne  the  name  of  the  Province  of  Quebec.  It  has  a 
population  of  nearly  a  million  and  a  half,  while  the 
whole  Dominion  does  not  contain  four  millions  and  a 
half.  These  are  Frenchmen  and  Catholics  in  the 
midst  of  a  population  mainly  English  and  Protestant. 
It  is  not  so  long  since  the  inconvenience  of  this  alien 
population  was  felt  in  Canada  by  discords  essentially 
similar  to  those  which  the  nationality-question  has 
created  in  Austria  and  Russia.  The  Canadian  Re- 
bellion which  marked  the  first  years  of  the  reign  of 
Queen  Victoria,  was  in  fact  a  war  of  nationality  in 
the  British  Empire,  though  it  wore  the  disguise  of  a 
war  of  liberty,  as  Lord  Durham  expressly  remarks 


Ill  THE  EMPIRE  57 

in  the  opening  of  his  famous  Report  on  Canada  :  "  I 
expected  to  find  a  contest  between  a  government  and 
a  people ;  I  found  two  nations  warring  in  the  bosom 
of  a  single  state ;  I  found  a  struggle  not  of  principles 
but  of  races."  It  is  however  to  be  remarked  on  the 
other  side  that  here  too  the  alien  element  dwindles, 
and  is  likely  ultimately  to  be  lost  in  the  English 
immigration,  and  also  that  its  animosity  has  been 
much  pacified  by  the  introduction  of  federal  in- 
stitutions. 

In  the  third  or  West  Indian  group  also  the  differ- 
ences of  nationality  are  considerable.  Here  almost 
alone  in  our  Empire  are  to  be  traced  the  eff"ects  of 
the  peculiar  phenomenon  of  the  history  of  the  New 
World,  negro  slavery.  Here  it  first  appeared  on  a 
considerable  scale,  as  the  immediate  result  of  the 
discovery  of  Columbus.  So  long  as  it  lasted,  it  did 
not  call  into  existence  the  nationality-difficulty,  for  a 
thoroughly  enslaved  nation  is  a  nation  no  longer,  and 
a  servile  insurrection  is  wholly  different  from  the 
insurrection  of  an  oppressed  nationality.  But  when 
slavery  is  abolished,  while  the  slaves  themselves  re- 
main, stamped  so  visibly  in  colour  and  physical  type 
with  the  badge  of  their  different  nationality,  yet  now 
free  and  laying  claim  to  citizenship,  then  it  is  that 
the  nationality-difl^iculty  begins  to  threaten.  But  in 
the  West-Indian  group  such  difficulties  for  the  present 
do  not  take  a  serious  form,  because  the  colonies  are 
in  the  main  dispersed  in  small  islands  and  have  no 
community  of  feeling. 

It  is  in  the  fourth  or  South  African  group  that 


58  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect 

the  nationality-difficulty  is  most  serious.  It  is  here 
a  double  difficulty.  There  have  been  two  conquests, 
the  one  superinduced  upon  the  other.  The  Dutch 
first  settled  themselves  among  the  native  races,  and 
then  the  Dutch  colony  was  conquered  by  England. 
So  far  the  case  may  seem  to  resemble  that  of  Canada, 
where  the  French  settled  among  the  Indians  and  were 
then  conquered  by  the  English.  But  there  are  two 
differences.  In  the  first  place  the  native  tribes  of 
South  Africa,  instead  of  disappearing  and  dwindling 
before  the  whites,  greatly  outnumber  them,  and  show 
a  power  of  combination  and  progress  such  as  the  Red 
Indian  never  showed.  Thus  in  the  census  of  1875  I 
find  that  the  Cape  Colony  had  a  total  population  of 
nearly  three  quarters-  of  a  million,  but  two  out  of  the 
three  quarters  were  native  and  only  one  European. 
And  behind  this  native  population  dwelling  among  the 
settlers  there  is  an  indefinite  native  population  ex- 
tending without  limit  into  the  interior  of  the  vast 
continent.  But  secondly  the  other  difficulty,  which 
arises  from  the  fact  that  the  settlers  themselves  were 
at  the  outset  not  English  but  Dutch,  does  not  diminish 
or  tend  to  disappear,  as  it  has  done  in  Canada.  In 
Canada  there  took  place  a  rapid  immigration  of  Eng- 
lish, who,  showing  themselves  in  a  marked  degree 
more  energetic  than  the  French  and  increasing  much 
faster,  gradually  gave  the  whole  community  a  pre- 
dominantly English  character,  so  that  in  fact  the 
rising  of  the  French  in  1838  was  the  convulsion  of 
despair  of  a  sinking  nationality.  Nothing  similar 
has  happened  in  South  Africa,  no  rapid  English  im- 


Ill  THE  EMPIRE  69 

migration  has  come  to  give  a  new  character  to  the 
community. 

These  are  the  abatements  which  must  be  made  to 
the  general  proposition  that  Greater  Britain  is  homo- 
geneous in  nationality.  They  need  not  prevent  us 
from  laying  down  this  general  proposition  as  true. 
If  in  these  islands  we  feel  ourselves  for  all  purposes 
one  nation,  though  in  Wales,  in  Scotland  and  in 
Ireland  there  is  Celtic  blood,  and  Celtic  languages 
utterly  unintelligible  to  us  are  still  spoken,  so  in  the 
Empire  a  good  many  French  and  Dutch  and  a  good 
many  Caffres  and  Maories  may  be  admitted  without 
marring  the  ethnological  unity  of  the  whole. 

This  ethnological  unity  is  of  great  importance 
when  we  would  form  an  opinion  about  the  stability 
and  chance  of  duration  of  the  Empire.  .  The  chief 
forces  which  hold  a  community  together  and  cause  it 
to  constitute  one  State  are  three,  common  nationalit}', 
common  religion,  and  common  interest.  These  may 
act  in  various  degrees  of  intensity,  and  they  may  also 
act  singly  or  in  combination.  Now  when  it  is  argued 
that  Greater  Britain  is  a  union  which  will  not  last  long 
and  will  soon  fall  to  pieces,  the  ground  taken  is  that 
it  wants  the  third  of  these  binding  forces,  that  it  is 
not  held  together  by  community  of  interest.  "  What," 
it  is  said,  "  can  the  inhabitants  of  Australia  and  New 
Zealand,  living  on  the  other  side  of  the  Tropic  of 
Capricorn,  have  in  common  with  ourselves  who  live 
beyond  the  50th  degree  of  north  latitude?  Who 
does  not  see  tliat  two  communities  so  remote  from 
each  other  cannot  long  continue  parts  of  one  political 


60  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

whole  1 "  Now  this  is  a  very  important  consideration, 
especially  as  it  is  backed  by  the  impressive  fact  that 
our  American  Colonies  did  in  the  last  century  find 
their  union  with  us  intolerable.  But,  allowing  its 
importance,  we  may  remark  that,  even  if  this  bond 
is  wanting,  the  other  two  bonds  which  hold  states 
together  are  not  wanting.  Many  empires  in  which 
hostile  nationalities  and  religions  have  been  but 
artificially  united  have  nevertheless  lasted  several 
centuries,  but  Greater  Britain  is  not  a  mere  empire, 
though  we  often  call  it  so.  Its  union  is  of  the  more 
vital  kind.  It  is  united  by  blood  and  religion,  and 
though  circumstances  may  be  imagined  in  which 
these  ties  might  snap,  yet  they  are  strong  ties,  and 
will  only  give  way  before  some  violent  dissolving 
force. 

I  have  enlarged  in  this  lecture  upon  the  essential 
nature  of  our  colonial  Empire,  because  there  is  much 
ambiguity  both  about  the  word  "  colonial  "  and  about 
the  word  "Empire."  Our  colonies  do  not  resemble  the 
colonies  which  classical  students  meet  with  in  Greek 
and  Eoman  history,  and  our  Empire  is  not  an  Empire 
at  all  in  the  ordinary  sense  of  the  word.  It  does  not 
consist  of  a  congeries  of  nations  held  together  by 
force,  but  in  the  main  of  one  nation,  as  much  as  if  it 
were  no  Empire  but  an  ordinary  state.  This  fact  is 
fundamental  when  we  look  to  the  future  and  inquire 
whether  it  is  calculated  for  duration. 

But  I  have  also  enlarged  upon  the  whole  class  of 
Empires  which  sprang  out  of  the  discovery  of  the  New 
World,  to  which  class  our  own  Empire  belongs,  in 


Ill  THE  EMPIRE  61 

order  that  we  may  understand  the  past.  England  in 
the  eighteenth  century  is  regarded,  I  said,  too  much 
as  a  European  insular  State  and  too  little  as  an 
American  and  Asiatic  Empire ;  in  short,  we  think  of 
Great  Britain  too  much  and  of  Greater  Britain  too 
little.  But  the  misconception  spreads  further,  for  in 
that  century  there  is  also  a  Greater  France,  a  Greater 
Holland,  a  Greater  Portugal,  and  a  Greater  Spain, 
and  all  these  we  overlook  as  we  overlook  Greater 
Britain. 

Here  is  a  fundamental  characteristic  of  the 
European  States  during  the  eighteenth  and  seven- 
teenth centuries,  which  is  seldom  borne  in  mind, 
namely  that  each  of  the  five  Western  States  has  an 
Empire  in  the  New  World  attached  to  it.  Before  the 
seventeenth  century  this  condition  of  things  was  but 
beginning,  and  since  the  eighteenth  it  has  ceased 
again  to  exist.  The  vast  immeasurable  results  of  the 
discovery  of  Columbus  were  developed  with  extreme 
slowness,  so  that  the  whole  sixteenth  century  passed 
away  before  most  of  these  nations  bestiiTcd  them- 
selves to  claim  a  share  in  the  New  World.  There 
existed  no  independent  Holland  till  near  the  end  of 
that  century,  so  that  a  furtiori  there  could  be  no 
Greater  Holland,  nor  did  either  England  or  France 
in  that  century  become  possessors  of  colonies. 
France  did  indeed  plan  a  settlement  in  North 
America,  as  the  name  Carolina,  derived  from  Charles 
IX.  of  Fi'ance,  still  remains  to  prove,  but  the  neigh- 
bouring Spaniards  of  Florida  interfered  to  destroy  it. 
A  little  later  Sir  Walter  Raleigh's  colony  in  the  same 


62  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect, 

neighbourhood  disappeared  altogether,  leaving  no 
trace  behind  it.  Accordingly  during  almost  the 
whole  of  that  century  the  New  World  remained  in 
the  possession  of  the  two  States  which  had  done  most 
to  lay  it  open,  viz.  Spain  and  Portugal,  Spain  look- 
ing chiefly  towards  America  and  Portugal  towards 
Asia,  until  in  1580  the  two  States  coalesced  in  a 
union  which  lasted  sixty  years.  The  Dutch  made 
their  grand  entrance  into  the  competition  for  empire 
in  the  seven  years  from  1595  to  1602,  and  they  were 
followed  by  France  and  England  in  the  early  years  of 
the  seventeenth  century,  that  is,  in  the  reign  of  our 
King  James  I. 

Again  in  the  nineteenth  century  the  competition 
of  these  five  states  in  the  New  World  ceased.  It 
ceased  from  two  causes :  wars  of  independence,  in 
which  Transatlantic  colonies  severed  themselves  from 
the  mother-country,  and  the  colonial  conquests  of 
England.  I  have  described  already  the  Hundred 
Years'  War  in  which  Greater  France  was  swallowed 
up  in  Greater  Britain  ;  Greater  Holland  in  like  manner 
suffered  serious  diminution,  losing  the  Cape  of  Good 
Hope  and  Demerara  to  England,  though  even  now  a 
Greater  Holland  may  be  said  to  exist  in  the  magni- 
ficent dependency  of  Java,  with  a  population  of  not 
less  than  nineteen  millions.  The  fall  of  Greater 
Spain  and  Greater  Portugal  has  happened  in  the 
present  century  within  the  lifetime  of  many  who  are 
still  among  us.  If  we  estimated  occurrences  less  by 
the  excitement  they  cause  at  the  moment  and  more 
by  the  consequences  which  are  certain  to  follow  them, 


Ill  THE  EMPIRE  63 

we  should  call  this  one  of  the  most  stupendous  events 
in  the  history  of  the  globe,  for  it  is  the  beginning  of 
the  independent  life  of  almost  the  Avhole  of  Southern 
and  Central  America.  It  took  place  mainly  in  the 
twenties  of  this  century,  and  was  the  result  of  a 
series  of  rebellions  which,  when  we  inquire  into  their 
origin,  we  find  to  have  arisen  out  of  the  shock  given 
to  Spain  and  Portugal  by  Napoleon's  invasion  of  them, 
so  that  in  fact  one  of  the  chief,  if  not  the  chief,  result 
of  Napoleon's  career  has  been  the  fall  of  Greater 
Spain  and  Greater  Portugal,  and  the  independence  of 
South  America. 

The  result  of  all  these  mighty  revolutions — of 
which  however  I  fancy  that  few  of  you  know  any- 
thing— is  that  the  Western  States  of  Europe,  with  the 
exception  of  England,  have  been  in  the  main  severed 
again  from  the  New  World.  This  of  course  is  only 
roughly  true.  Spain  still  possesses  Cuba  and  Porto 
Rico,  Portugal  still  has  large  African  possessions,  France 
has  begun  to  found  a  new  Empire  in  North  Africa. 
Nevertheless  these  four  states  have  materially  altered 
their  position  in  the  world.  They  have  become  in 
the  main  purely  European  States  again,  as  they  were 
before  Columbus  crossed  the  Atlantic.  It  is  easy  to 
show  you  the  immense  magnitude  of  this  change. 
Spain  has  lately  passed  through  a  disturbed  time. 
She  expelled  a  Bourbon  sovereign  and  tried  for  a 
time  the  experiment  of  a  Republic.  This  change  was 
doubtless  very  serious  in  the  peninsula,  but  it  pro- 
duced wonderfully  little  excitement  in  the  world  at 
large.      Now  if  anything  similar  had  happened  in  the 


64  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

eighteenth  or  in  the  seventeenth  century,  the  shock 
of  it  would  have  been  felt  over  a  great  part  of  the 
planet.  From  Mexico  to  Buenos  Ayres,  from  above 
the  Tropic  of  Cancer  to  below  the  Tropic  of  Capricorn, 
every  territory  probably  would  have  been  convulsed 
with  rebellion  and  civil  war.  In  like  manner  the 
recent  calamities  in  France  would  in  the  eighteenth 
century  have  shaken  the  St.  Lawrence,  the  Great 
Lakes  of  North  America  and  the  Mississippi,  and 
have  influenced  the  policy  of  princes  in  the  Deccan 
and  the  valley  of  the  Ganges,  nay  perhaps  have 
altered  the  balance  of  Hindostan.  As  it  was,  those 
calamities  were  nearly  confined  to  France  itself ;  else- 
where sympathies  were  excited,  but  interests  were 
not  touched. 

Thus  then  we  see  in  the  seventeenth  and  still  more 
the  eighteenth  century  a  period  when  the  New  World 
was  attached  in  a  peculiar  way  to  the  five  Western 
States  of  the  European  system.  This  attachment 
modifies  and  determines  all  the  wars  and  negotiations, 
all  the  international  relations  of  Europe  during  that 
period.  In  the  last  lecture  I  pointed  out  that  the 
struggle  between  England  and  France  in  those 
centuries  cannot  be  understood  so  long  as  we  look  at 
Europe  alone,  and  that  the  belligerents  are  really  the 
World-Powers,  Greater  Britain  and  Greater  France. 
Now  I  remark  that  in  like  manner  during  the  same 
period  we  must  always  read  for  Holland,  Portugal, 
and  Spain,  Greater  Holland,  Greater  Portugal,  and 
Greater  Spain.  I  remark  also  that  this  state  of 
things  has  now  passed  away,  that  the  Spanish  Empire, 


Ill  THE  EMPIEE  65 

and  in  the  main  also  the  Portuguese  and  Dutch 
Empires,  have  gone  the  same  way  as  the  Empire  of 
France.  But  Greater  Britain  still  remains.  And 
thus  we  perceive  the  historical  origin  and  character 
of  this  Empire.  It  is  the  sole  survivor  of  a  whole 
family  of  Empires,  which  arose  out  of  the  action  of 
the  discovery  of  the  New  World  upon  the  peculiar 
condition  and  political  ideas  of  Europe.  All  these 
Empires  were  beset  by  certain  dangers,  which  Greater 
Britain  alone  has  hitherto  escaped,  though  she  too 
has  felt  the  shock  of  them  and  is  still  exposed  to 
them,  and  the  great  question  now  is  whether  she  can 
modify  her  defective  constitution  in  such  a  way  as 
to  escape  them  for  the  future. 


LECTURE  IV 

THE  OLD  COLONIAL  SYSTEM 

I  REMARKED  that  ancient  Greek  colonisation,  com- 
pared with  the  modern  system,  might  be  called  in  a 
certain  sense  the  natural  system.  And  yet  the 
modern  system  might  be  represented  as  natural  also. 
The  Greeks  regard  the  State  as  essentially  small,  and 
infer  that  a  surplus  population  can  only  be  accommo- 
dated by  founding  another  State.  But  is  there  any- 
thing necessarily  unnatural  in  the  other  view,  that 
the  State  is  capable  of  indefinite  growth  and  expan- 
sion "J  The  ripe  fruit  dropping  from  the  tree  and 
giving  rise  to  another  tree  may  be  natural,  but  so  is 
the  acorn  spreading  into  the  huge  oak,  that  has 
hundreds  of  branches  and  thousands  of  leaves.  If 
Miletus  among  its  daughter-cities  may  remind  us  of 
the  one,  England  expanding  into  Greater  Britain 
resembles  the  other. 

And  yet  surely  there  must  be  something  unnatural 
in  the  system  against  which  our  own  colonists  revolted 
a  hundred  years  ago,  and  the  colonists  of  Spain  and 
Portugal  a  few  years  later 


LECT.  IV  THE  OLD  COLONIAL  SYSTEM  67 

The  truth  is  that  the  simple  idea  of  expansion  has 
seldom  been  conceived  or  realised  clearly. 

Let  us  work  out  a  little  in  our  minds  the  concep- 
tion of  a  Greater  Britain,  of  the  English  State 
extended  indefinitely  without  being  altered.  The 
question  is  often  asked,  What  is  the  good  of  colonies  ? 
but  no  such  question  could  possibly  be  raised,  if 
colonies  really  were  such  a  simple  extension  of  the 
mother-state.  Whether  this  extension  is  practicable 
may  be  questioned,  but  it  cannot  be  questioned  that 
if  it  were  practicable  it  would  be  desirable. 

We  must  begin  by  recognising  that  the  unoccupied 
territory  of  the  globe  is  to  those  who  take  possession 
of  it  so  much  wealth  in  the  most  absolute  sense  of  the 
word.  The  epitaph  which  said  that  to  Leon  and  Aragon 
Columbus  gave  a  new  world  was  almost  literally  true. 
He  conferred  upon  certain  persons  a  large  landed 
estate,  and  if,  as  the  result,  many  poor  people  did 
not  become  rich  and  many  unfortunate  people  pros- 
perous, the  fault  must  have  lain  in  the  distribution  or 
administration  of  the  wealth  which  he  conferred. 
By  his  discovery  the  nations  of  Europe  came  in  for  a 
landed  estate  so  enormously  large  that  it  might  easily 
have  converted  every  poor  man  in  Europe  into  a 
landed  proprietor. 

But  one  thing  was  necessary  before  all  this  wealth 
could  be  reduced  into  possession  and  enjoyment. 
Property  can  exist  only  under  the  guardianship  of 
the  State.  In  order  therefore  that  the  lands  of  the 
New  World  might  become  secure  enjoyable  property, 
States  must  be  set  up  in  the  New  World.    Without  the 


68  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

State  the  settler  "would  run  the  risk  of  being  murdered 
by  Indians,  or  attacked  by  rival  settlers  of  some 
hostile  nationality.  On  the  other  hand  suppose  the 
reign  of  law  and  government  established  in  the  New 
World,  as  in  Europe,  so  that  property  is  equally 
secure,  then  the  poor  man  in  Europe  who  finds  life 
painful  and  the  acquisition  of  land  in  these  crowded 
countries  utterly  beyond  his  power,  has  only  to 
transfer  himself  to  the  New  World,  where  land  is 
cheaper,  and  he  is  at  once  enriched  as  much  as  if  he 
had  received  a  legacy. 

Thus  there,  can  be  no  dispute  about  the  value  of 
organised  States  in  the  less  crowded  parts  of  the  globe. 
But  why  should  these  be  our  own  colonies  ?  There 
is  nothing  to  prevent  the  emigrant  from  settling  in 
a  colony  belonging  to  some  different  European  State 
or  in  an  independent  State.  Why  need  we  trouble 
ourselves  therefore  to  keep  up  colonies  of  our  own  ? 

This  is  a  strange  question,  which  would  never  be 
asked  in  England  but  for  an  exceptional  circumstance. 
Most  people  like  to  live  among  their  own  country- 
men, under  the  laws,  religion  and  institutions  they 
are  accustomed  to.  They  place  themselves  moreover 
most  really  and  practically  at  a  disadvantage  by 
going  to  live  among  people  who  speak  a  different 
language.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  we  do  not  find  that, 
the  course  of  emigration  being  free,  any  large  number 
of  Englishmen  yearly  settle  in  those  New  World 
States  which  are  really  foreign,  that  is,  in  the  South 
American  Republics  or  in  Brazil  or  in  Mexico. 
There  would  be  no  question  at  all  about  the  value  of 


IV  THE  OLD  COLONIAL  SYSTEM  69 

colonies,  and  we  should  all  as  a  matter  of  course 
consider  that  only  by  means  of  colonies  was  it 
possible  to  bring  the  wealth  of  the  New  World 
within  the  reach  of  our  population,  if  it  were  not  for 
the  existence  of  the  United  States.  But  the  United 
States  are  to  us  almost  as  good  as  a  colony ;  our 
people  can  emigrate  thither  without  sacrificing  their 
language  or  chief  institutions  or  habits.  And  the 
Union  is  so  large  and  prosperous  and  fills  our  view 
so  much,  that  we  forget  how  very  exceptional  its 
relation  to  us  is,  and  also  that  if  it  is  to  us  almost  as 
good  as  a  colony,  this  is  only  because  it  was  con- 
structed out  of  English  colonies.  In  estimating  the 
value  of  colonies  in  the  abstract,  we  shall  only  confuse 
ourselves  by  recollecting  this  unique  case  ;  we  ought 
to  put  the  United  States  entirely  out  of  view. 

Considered  in  the  abstract  then,  colonies  are 
neither  more  nor  less  than  a  great  augmentation  of 
the  national  estate.  They  are  lands  for  the  landless, 
prosperity  and  wealth  for  those  in  straitened  cir- 
cumstances. This  is  a  very  simple  view,  and  yet  it 
is  much  overlooked,  as  if  somehow  it  were  too  simple 
to  be  understood.  History  offers  many  examples  of 
nations  cramped  for  want  of  room;  it  records  in  many 
cases  how  they  swarmed  irresistibly  across  their 
frontiers  and  spread  like  a  deluge  over  neighbouring 
countries,  where  sometimes  they  found  lands  and 
wealth.  Now  we  may  be  very  sure  that  never  any 
nation  was  half  so  much  cramped  for  want  of  room  in 
the  olden  time  as  our  own  nation  is  now.  Populations 
so  dense  as  that  of  modern  England  are  a  phenomenon 


70  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LEOT, 

quite  new  at  least  in  Europe.     We  continually  speak 
of  our  country  as  crowded,  and,  since  the  rate  of  increase 
of  population  is  tolerably  constant,  we  sometimes  ask 
with  alarm  what  will  be  its  condition  half  a  century 
hence.    "The  territory,"  we  say,  "is  a  fixed  quantity; 
we  have  but  120,000  square  miles;  it  is  crowded  already 
and  yet  the  population  doubles  in  some  seventy  years. 
What  will  become  of  us  ? "     Now  here  is  a  curious 
example  of  our  habit  of  leaving  our  colonial  posses- 
sions out  of  account.     What !  our  country  is  small ; 
a  poor,  120,000  square  miles  ?    I  find  the  fact  to  be 
very  difi"erent.     I  find  that  the  territory  governed  by 
the  Queen  is  of  almost  boundless  extent.     Let  us 
deduct  from  the  vast  total  India,  as  not  much  open 
to  settlement,  still  the  territory  subject  to  the  Queen 
is  much  greater  than  that  of  the  United  States,  though 
that  is  uniformly  cited  as  the  example  of  a  country 
not  crowded  and  in  which  there  is  boundless  room  for 
expansion.     It  may  be  true  that  the  mother-country 
of  this  great  Empire  is  crowded,  but  in  order   to 
relieve  the  pressure  it  is  not  necessary  for  us,  as  if  we 
were  Goths  or  Turcomans,  to  seize  upon  the  territory 
of  our  neighbours,  it  is  not  necessary  even  to  incur 
great  risks  or  undergo  great  hardships ;   it  is  only 
necessary  to  take  possession  of  boundless  territories 
in  Canada,  South  Africa  and  Australia,  where  already 
our  language  is  spoken,  our  religion  professed,  and 
our  laws  established.     If  there  is  pauperism  in  Wilt- 
shire and   Dorsetshire,   this  is  but    complementary 
to  unowned  wealth  in  Australia;    on  the  one  side 
there  are  men  without  property,  on  the  other  there 


IV  THE  OLD  COLONIAL  SYSTEM  71 

is  property  waiting  for  men.  And  yet  we  do  not 
allow  these  two  facts  to  come  together  in  our  minds, 
but  brood  anxiously  and  almost  despairingly  over 
the  problem  of  pauperism,  and  when  colonies  are 
mentioned  we  ask.  What  is  the  good  of  colonies  ? 

Partly  no  doubt  this  is  due  simply  to  a  want  of- 
system  in  our  way  of  thinking  on  subjects  of  this 
kind,  but  partly  also  it  is  evident  that  colonies  have 
never  been  regarded  in  England  as  a  simple  extension 
of  the  English  state  and  nation  over  new  territory. 
They  have  been  thought  of  no  doubt  as  belonging  to 
England,  though  precariously,  but  at  the  same  time 
as  outside  of  England,  so  that  what  goes  out  of 
England  to  them  is  in  a  manner  lost  to  England. 
This  appears  clearly  from  the  argument  which  is  often 
urged  against  emigration  on  any  large  scale,  viz.  that 
it  might  be  good  for  the  emigrants,  but  that  it  would 
be  ruinous  to  England,  which  would  be  deprived  of 
all  the  best  and  hardiest  part  of  its  population  — 
deprived,  for  it  is  not  imagined  that  such  emigrants 
could  remain  Englishmen,  or  be  still  serviceable  to 
the  English  commonwealth.  Compare  this  view  of 
emigration  with  that  taken  in  the  United  States, 
where  the  constant  movement  of  the  population 
westward,  the  constant  settlement  of  new  Territories, 
which  in  due  time  rise  to  be  States,  is  not  regarded 
as  either  a  symptom  or  a  cause  of  weakness, 
not  at  all  as  a  draining-out  of  vitality,  but  on  the 
contrary  as  the  greatest  evidence  of  vigour  and  the 
best  means  of  increasing  it. 

We  have  not  really  then  as  yet  a  Greater  Britain. 


72  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

When  I  speak  of  the  creation  of  Greater  Britain 
during  the  eighteenth  century,  I  in  a  certain  sense 
exaggerate.  In  our  colonial  Empire  was  laid  the 
foundation  of  a  Greater  Britain,  and  a  Greater  Britain 
may  in  the  end  arise  out  of  it,  but  nothing  of  the 
kind  was  originally  intended,  nor  later  was  the  true 
significance  of  what  had  taken  place  perceived.  A 
colony  was  not  really  thought  of  as  an  extension  of 
the  mother-state,  but  as  something  different.  What 
then  was  the  precise  conception  formed  of  a  colony  t 
We  find  ourselves  forced  to  ask  this  question  again. 

I  have  pointed  out  already  that  in  the  sixteenth 
century  there  was  no  natural  overflow  of  population 
from  Europe  into  the  New  World.  Europe  was  not 
over-peopled;  there  was  no  imperious  demand  for 
more  room.  Why  then  should  the  conception,  so 
natural  to  us  in  these  days,  of  a  territorial  extension 
of  the  State  occur  to  those  who  lived  at  the  time 
of  the  discoveries?  We  see  on  the  contrary  that 
contemporary  statesmen  were  puzzled  to  decide  what 
use  could  be  made,  and  even  doubted  whether  any 
use  could  be  made,  of  the  new  lands.  Sebastian 
Cabot  is  encouraged  by  Henry  VII.,  until  it  is  found 
that  he  does  not  bring  back  spices;  then  he  is 
neglected,  and  abandons  England  for  the  Spanish 
service.-^  Thus  the  same  cause  which  made  it  neces- 
sary to  call  in  the  help  of  the  State  led  to  a  peculiarly 
materialistic  view  of  the  work  of  settlement.  What 
the   State   wanted  was   revenue;   hence   it  became 

1  Schanz,  JHhiglische  Handelspolitik.  Read  the  whole  chapter 
entitled,  Die  Stdlung  der  bdden  ersten  Tudors  zu  den  Entdechungen. 


TV  THE  OLD  COLONIAL  SYSTEM  73 

necessary  to  regard  the  new  countries  rather  as  so 
much  wealth  to  be  transported  into  Europe  than  as  a 
new  seat  for  European  civilisation. 

I  spoke  before  of  natural  colonisation,  intending 
such  colonisation  as  results  from  the  spread  of  a  race 
over  an  unbounded  territory  at  a  time  when  political 
institutions  are  in  their  infancy.  The  colonisation  of 
the  sixteenth  century  is  curiously  different.  It  arises 
from  the  discovery  of  remote  regions  of  unknown 
wealth  by  nations  accustomed  to  a  limited  space  and 
to  a  rigorous  government.  As  in  the  former  kind  the 
State  scarcely  appears,  but  individuals  or  rather  tribes 
accomplish  the  work,  and  in  making  a  new  settle- 
ment make  a  new  state,  in  the  latter  kind  the  State 
takes  the  lead,  superintends  the  settlement,  recruits 
for  it,  holds  it  in  subjection  when  it  is  made,  and,  as 
a  consequence,  looks  to  make  a  profit  out  of  it.  At 
first  sight  this  latter  system  might  seem  less  material- 
istic than  the  other,  for  it  conceives  the  State  as 
resting  not  upon  mere  locality  but  upon  kindred ;  but 
it  becomes  more  materialistic  in  practice  because  it 
looks  at  the  colony  purely  with  the  eyes  of  the 
Government,  and  therefore  from  a  purely  fiscal  point 
of  view.  Hence  in  the  first  settlement  of  America 
the  conception  of  a  Spanish  colony  as  an  extension  of 
Spain  was  mixed  up  with  a  different  conception  of  it 
as  a  possession  belonging  to  Spain.  And  whereas  the 
first  conception,  though  it  was  formed  instinctively, 
yet  answered  to  nothing  in  experience, — for  who  had 
ever  heard  of  two  parts  of  the  same  State  separated 
by  the  whole  breadth  of  the  Atlantic  Ocean  1 — the 


74  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

second  conception  was  less  embarrassing  in  practice 
because  it  was  by  no  means  new.  There  had  been 
examples  in  the  Middle  Ages  of  States  possessing 
dependencies  separated  from  them  by  the  sea,  and  I 
daresay  it  might  be  possible  to  show  that  the  Spanish 
Council  of  the  Indies  was  guided  at  times  by  the 
precedents  afforded  by  Venice  in  its  dealings  with 
Candia  and  with  its  dependencies  in  the  Adriatic. 
The  Venetian  conception  of  a  dependency  was  purely 
selfish  and  commercial.  So  far  from  thinking  of  it  as 
forming  part  of  the  Republic,  they  regarded  it  as  so 
much  live  stock  forming  part  of  the  wealth  of  the 
Republic.  Thus  it  was  by  confounding  together  two 
theories  radically  inconsistent  with  each  other  that 
the  modern  colonial  system,  first  formed  by  Spain  and 
adopted  with  more  or  less  modification  by  the  other 
Powers  of  Europe,  came  into  existence. 

Now  we  have  this  conception  more  or  less  distinctly 
in  our  minds  whenever  we  ask  the  question,  What  is 
the  good  of  colonies  ?  That  question  implies  that  we 
think  of  a  colony,  not  as  part  of  our  State,  but  as  a 
possession  belonging  to  it.  For  we  should  think  it 
absurd  to  raise  such  a  question  about  a  recognised 
part  of  the  body  politic.  Who  ever  thought  of 
inquiring  whether  Cornwall  or  Kent  rendered  any 
•  sufficient  return  for  the  money  which  we  lay  out  upon 
them,  whether  those  counties  were  worth  keeping  1 
The  tie  that  holds  together  the  parts  of  a  nation- 
state  is  of  another  kind ;  it  is  not  composed  of  con- 
siderations of  profit  and  loss,  but  is  analogous  to  the 
family  bond.     The  same  tie  would  hold  a  nation  to 


IV  THE  OLD  COLONIAL  SYSTEM  75 

its  colonies,  if  colonies  were  regarded  as  simply  an 
extension  of  the  nation.  If  Greater  Britain  in  the 
full  sense  of  the  phrase  really  existed,  Canada  and 
Australia  would  be  to  us  as  Kent  and  Cornwall.  But 
if  once  we  cease  to  regard  a  colony  in  this  way,  if  we 
consider  that  the  emigrants,  who  have  gone  forth 
from  us,  have  ceased  to  belong  to  our  community, 
then  we  must  form  some  other  conception  of  their 
relation  to  us.  And  this  must  either  be  the  old  Greek 
conception  which  treats  them  as  grown-up  children 
who  have  married  and  settled  at  a  distance,  so  that 
the  family  bond  has  dissolved  away  by  the  mere 
necessity  of  circumstances,  or  if  the  connection  is 
maintained,  as  the  modern  States  insisted  on  main- 
taining it,  it  must  change  its  character.  It  must  rest 
on  interest.  The  question  must  be  asked.  What  is 
the  good  of  the  colony  1  and  it  must  be  answered  by 
some  proof  that  the  colony  considered  as  a  piece  of 
property,  or  as  an  investment  of  public  money,  pays. 
Now  this  may  be  a  very  good  basis  for  the  union 
of  two  countries,  provided  the  benefit  received  from 
the  union  is  mutual.  In  this  case  it  constitutes  a 
federation,  and  there  are  many  instances  in  which, 
without  any  tie  of  kindred,  countries  have  been  held 
together  in  such  a  union  simply  by  the  sense  of  a 
common  interest.  Among  these  instances  are  Austria 
and  Hungary,  the  German,  French  and  Italian  cantons 
of  the  Swiss  Confederation.  Such  would  be  the  case 
of  our  own  Empire,  if  not  only  we  ourselves  felt  that 
our  colonies  paid — that  is,  that  we  reaped  some 
advantage  from  them  which  we  should  cease  to  reap  if 


76  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAIrt)  LECT. 

they  became  independent — but  also  the  colonies  felt 
that  the  mother-country  paid,  and  that  they  gained 
something  by  the  connection  with  it.  And  in  the 
present  day  it  is  quite  easy  to  imagine  such  a  sense 
of  common  interest  existing  between  us  and  even  the 
remotest  of  our  colonies,  because  in  the  present  day 
distance  has  been  almost  abolished  by  steam  and 
electricity.  But  in  the  first  ages  after  the  discovery 
of  the  New  World  such  a  common  interest  was  less 
possible.  The  Atlantic  Ocean  was  then  for  practical 
purposes  a  far  deeper  and  wider  gulf,  across  which 
any  reciprocal  exchange  of  services  could  not  easily 
take  place.  And  so  the  old  colonial  system  in 
general  had  not  the  character  of  an  equal  federation. 
It  is  the  custom  to  describe  the  old  colonies  as 
sacrificed  to  the  mother-country.  We  must  be  careful 
not  to  admit  that  statement  without  qualification. 
It  is  supposed  for  instance  that  the  revolt  of  otir  own 
American  colonies  was  provoked  by  the  selfish 
treatment  of  the  mother-country,  which  shackled  their 
trade  without  rendering  them  any  benefit  in  return 
for  these  restraints.  This  is  far  from  being  true. 
Between  England  and  the  American  colonies  there 
was  a  real  interchange  of  services.  England  gave 
defence  in  return  for  trade-privileges.  In  the  middle 
of  the  last  century,  at  the  time  when  the  American 
quarrel  began,  it  was  perhaps  rather  the  colonies  than 
the  mother-country  that  had  fallen  into  arrear.  We 
had  been  involved  in  two  great  wars  mainly  by  our 
colonies,  and  the  final  breach  was  provoked  not  so 
much  by  the  pressure  of  England  upon  the  colonies 


IV  THE  OLD  COLONIAL  SYSTEM  77 

as  by  that  of  the  colonies  upon  England.  If  we 
imposed  taxes  upon  them,  it  was  to  meet  the  debt 
which  we  had  incurred  in  their  behalf,  and  we  saw 
with  not  unnatural  bitterness  that  we  had  ourselves 
enabled  our  colonies  to  do  without  us,  by  destroying 
for  their  interest  the  French  power  in  North  America. 

Still  it  was  true  of  the  old  colonial  system  in 
general  that  it  placed  the  colony  in  the  position,  not 
so  much  of  a  state  in  federation,  as  of  a  conquered 
state.  Some  theory  of  the  kind  is  evidently  implied 
in  the  language  which  is  commonly  used.  We  speak 
of  the  colonial  possessions  of  England  or  of  Spain. 
Now  in  what  sense  can  one  population  be  spoken  of 
as  the  possession  of  another  population  ?  The  ex- 
pression almost  seems  to  imply  slavery,  and  at  any 
rate  it  is  utterly  inappropriate,  if  it  merely  means 
that  the  one  population  is  subject  to  the  same 
Government  as  the  other.  At  the  bottom  of  it 
certainly  was  the  idea  that  the  colony  was  an  estate 
which  was  to  be  worked  for  the  benefit  of  the  mother- 
country. 

The  relation  of  Spain  to  its  colonies  had  become  a 
type  which  other  states  kept  before  their  eyes.  A 
native  population  reduced  to  serfdom,  in  some  parts 
driven  to  compulsory  labour  by  caciques  turned  into 
state-officials,  in  other  parts  exterminated  by  over- 
work and  then  replaced  by  negroes;  an  imperious 
mother-country  drawing  from  the  colony  a  steady 
revenue,  and  ruling  it  through  an  artful  mechanism 
of  division,  by  which  the  settlers  were  held  in  check 
by  the  priesthood  and  by  a  serf-population  treated 


78  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

paternally  that  it  might  be  available  for  that  purpose : 
such  was  the  tjrpical  colonial  system.  It  was  wholly 
unfit  to  be  a  model  to  such  a  colony  as  New  England, 
which  paid  no  revenue,  where  there  were  neither 
subject  Indians  nor  mines  of  gold  and  silver. 
Nevertheless  governments  could  not  afford  to  forget 
the  precedent  of  profitable  colonies,  and  I  find 
Charles  II.  appealing  to  it  in  1663.  It  became  an 
established  principle  that  a  colony  was  a  possession. 

Now  it  is  essentially  barbaric  that  one  community 
should  be  treated  as  the  property  of  another  and  the 
fruits  of  its  industry  confiscated,  not  in  return  for 
benefits  conferred,  but  by  some  absolute  right  whether 
of  conquest  or  otherwise.  Even  where  such  a 
relation  rests  avowedly  upon  conquest,  it  is  too 
immoral  to  last  long,  except  in  a  barbarous  state  of 
manners.  Thus  for  example  we  may  have  acquired 
India  by  conquest,  but  we  cannot  and  do  not  hold  it 
for  our  own  pecuniary  advantage.  We  draw  no 
tribute  from  it;  it  is  not  to  us  a  profitable  invest- 
ment ;  we  should  be  ashamed  to  acknowledge  that  in 
governing  it  we  in  any  way  sacrificed  its  interest  to 
our  own.  A  fortiori  then  it  is  barbaric  to  apply  such 
a  theory  to  colonies,  for  it  is  to  treat  one's  own 
countrymen,  those  with  whom  we  have  no  concern  at 
all  except  on  the  ground  of  kindred,  as  if  they  were 
conquered  enemies,  or  rather  in  a  way  in  which  a 
civilised  nation  cannot  treat  even  conquered  enemies. 
And  probably  even  in  the  old  colonial  system  such  a 
theory  was  not  consciously  and  deliberately  adopted. 
But  since  in  the  sixteenth  century  there  was  no 


IV  THE  OLD  COLONIAL  SYSTEM  79 

scruple  in  applying  it  to  conquered  dependencies,  and 
since  the  colonies  of  Spain  were  in  a  certain  sense 
conquered  dependencies,  we  can  understand  that 
unconsciously,  unintentionally,  the  barbaric  principle 
crept  into  her  colonial  system,  and  that  it  lurked 
there  and  poisoned  it  in  later  times.  We  can 
understand  too  how  the  example  of  Spain  and  the 
precedents  set  by  her  influenced  the  other  European 
States,  Holland,  France,  and  England,  which  entered 
upon  the  career  of  colonisation  a  century  later. 

In  the  case  of  some  of  these  States,  for  example 
France,  the  result  of  this  theory  was  that  the 
mother-country  exercised  an  iron  authority  over  her 
colonies.  In  Canada  the  French  settlers  were  subject 
to  a  multitude  of  rigid  regulations,  from  which  they 
would  have  been  free  if  they  had  remained  in  France. 
Nothing  of  the  kind  certainly  can  be  said  of  the 
English  colonies.  They  were  subject  to  certain  fixed 
restrictions  in  the  matter  of  trade,  but  apart  from 
these  they  were  absolutely  free.  Carrying  their 
nationality  with  them,  they  claimed  everywhere  the 
rights  of  Englishmen.  It  has  been  observed  by 
Mr.  Merivale  that  the  old  colonial  system  admitted 
no  such  thing  as  the  modern  Crown  Colony,  in 
which  Englishmen  are  governed  administratively 
without  representative  assemblies.  In  the  old 
system  assemblies  were  not  formally  instituted,  but 
grew  up  of  themselves,  because  it  was  the  nature  of 
Englishmen  to  assemble.  Thus  the  old  historian  of 
the  colonies,  Hutchinson,  writes  under  the  year 
1619,  "This  year  a  House  of  Burgesses  broke  out  in 


80  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

Virginia."  And  assuredly  the  Home  Government  in 
those  times  did  not  sin  by  too  much  interference. 
So  completely  were  the  colonies  left  to  themselves, 
that  some  of  them,  especially  those  of  New  England, 
were  from  the  very  beginning  for  most  practical 
purposes  independent  States.  As  early  as  1665,  only 
forty  years  after  the  first  settlement  and  a  hundred 
years  before  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  I  find 
that  Massachusetts  did  not  regard  itself  as  practically 
subject  to  England.  "  They  say,"  writes  a  Com- 
missioner,^ "that  so  long  as  they  pay  the  fifth  of 
all  gold  and  silver,  according  to  the  terms  of  the 
Charter,  they  are  not  obliged  to  the  King  but  by 
civility." 

Thus  our  old  colonial  system  was  not  practically 
at  all  tyrannous,  and  when  the  breach  came  the 
grievances  of  which  the  Americans  complained, 
though  perfectly  real,  were  smaller  than  ever  before 
or  since  led  to  such  mighty  consequences.  The 
misfortune  of  that  system  was  not  that  it  interfered 
too  much,  but  that  such  interference  as  it  admitted 
was  of  an  invidious  kind.  It  claimed  very  little, 
but  what  it  did  claim  was  unjust.  It  gave  un- 
bounded liberty  except  in  one  department,  namely 
trade,  and  in  that  department  it  interfered  to  fine 
the  colonists   for  the  benefit  of  the  home  traders. 

1  Calendar  of  state  Papers ;  Colonial,  December,  1665.  He 
adds  :  "  They  say  they  can  easily  spin  out  seven  years  by  writing, 
and  before  that  time  a  change  may  come  :  nay,  some  have  dared  to 
say,  Who  knows  what  the  event  of  this  Dutch  war  may  be  ?  They 
furnished  Cromwell  with  many  instruments  out  of  their  corporation 
and  college,  and  solicited  him  by  one  Mr.  Winsloe  to  be  declared  a 
Free  State,  and  now  style  and  believe  themselves  to  be  so." 


IV  THE  OLD  COLONIAL  SYSTEM  81 

Now  this  was  to  put  the  mother-country  in  a  false 
position.  It  put  her  forward  as  claiming  to  treat  the 
colonies  as  a  possession,  as  an  estate  to  be  worked 
for  the  benefit  of  those  Englishmen  who  remained  at 
home.  No  claim  could  be  more  invidious.  If  it  was 
not  quite  the  claim  that  a  master  makes  upon  a  slave, 
it  was  at  least  similar  to  that  which  an  absentee 
landlord  makes  upon  tenants  in  whom  he  takes  no 
further  interest,  and  yet  even  the  absentee  landlord, 
if  he  gives  nothing  else,  does  at  least  give  the  use 
of  land  which  was  really  his  own.  But  what — a 
Massachusetts  colonist  might  say — has  England  given 
to  us  that  she  should  have  this  perpetual  mortgage 
on  our  industry  1  The  Charter  of  James  I.  allowed 
us  the  use  of  lands  which  James  I.  never  saw  and 
which  did  not  belong  to  him, — lands  too  which,  with- 
out any  Charter,  we  might  perhaps  have  occupied  for 
ourselves  without  opposition. 

Thus  this  old  system  was  an  irrational  jumble  of 
two  opposite  conceptions.  It  claimed  to  rule  the 
colonists  because  they  were  Englishmen  and  brothers, 
and  yet  it  ruled  them  as  if  they  were  conquered 
Indians.  And  again  while  it  treated  them  as  con- 
quered people,  it  gave  them  so  much  liberty  that 
they  could  easily  rebel. 

I  have  shown  how  this  strange  hybrid  conception 
of  colonies  may  have  originally  sprung  up.  It  is  not 
very  difficult  perhaps  to  understand  how  the  English, 
after  once  adopting,  may  have  retained  it,  and  may 
have  never  seen  their  way  to  a  better  conception. 
In  the  then  condition  of  the  world,  if  the  English  had 
G 


82  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

thought  of  reforming  their  colonial  system,  their 
most  natural  course  would  have  been  to  cast  off  the 
colonies  altogether.  For  the  analogy  of  grown-up 
sons  and  daughters  applies  very  properly  to  the  case 
of  colonies,  when  they  are  so  remote  from  the  mother- 
country  that  they  have  come  to  have  wholly  different 
interests.  All  practical  union,  and  therefore  all 
authority  on  the  part  of  the  mother-country,  fall 
into  abeyance  in  these  circumstances,  and  the  Greek 
system  is  then  most  appropriate,  which  gives  complete 
independence  to  the  colony,  but  binds  it  in  per- 
petual alliance.  Now  in  the  seventeenth  century  our 
colonies  were,  at  least  in  ordinary  times,  practically 
too  remote  for  imion.  This  is  so  true  that  the 
difficulty  is  rather  to  understand  how  the  secession  of 
New  England  can  have  been  delayed  so  long ;  but  I 
imagine  the  retarding  cause  was  the  growth  of  the 
French  Power  in  North  America  towards  the  end 
of  the  seventeenth  century.  After  the  great  colonial 
struggle  of  France  and  England  had  fairly  begun, 
the  colonies  were  drawn  somewhat  nearer  to  us  than 
before,  and  we  can  imagine  that  if  Canada  had  not 
been  conquered  from  the  French  in  1759,  and  if  the 
struggle  with  France  instead  of  coming  to  an  end 
had  grown  more  intense,  the  colonies  would  have 
issued  no  Declaration  of  Independence,  and  our 
connection  with  them  might  have  been  put  on  a 
better  footing  instead  of  being  dissolved.  As  it 
was,  the  need  of  union  was  at  first  not  felt ;  it  was 
then  felt  strongly  for  a  time,  and  then  by  a  sudden 
deliverance  all  pressure  was  removed,  so  that  the 


IV  THE  OLD  COLONIAL  SYSTEM  83 

thought  of  a  reformed  colonial  system  gave  way  at 
once  to  the  dream  of  independence. 

In  these  circumstances  the  old  colonial  system 
would  naturally  be  retained  as  long  as  possible  by 
the  mother-country,  because  it  was  dangerous  to 
touch  it,  because  the  least  alteration  would  snap  the 
tie  that  held  the  colonies  altogether.  The  invidious 
rights  were  doggedly  maintained  simply  because 
they  existed,  and  because  no  alteration  for  the  better 
was  thought  possible. 

Probably  also  no  healthier  relation  could  then  be 
even  clearly  conceived.  I  have  described  colonies 
as  the  natural  outlet  for  superfluous  population,  the 
resource  by  which  those  who  find  themselves  crowded 
out  of  the  mother-country  may  live  at  ease,  without 
sacrificing  what  ought  to  be  felt  as  most  valuable, 
their  nationality.  But  how  could  such  a  view  occur 
to  EngKshmen  a  century  ago?  England  in  those 
days  was  not  over -peopled.  The  whole  of  Great 
Britain  had  perhaps  not  more  than  twelve  million 
inhabitants  at  the  time  of  the  American  War.  And 
if  even  then  there  was  more  diffused  prosperity  in 
the  colonies  than  at  home,  on  the  other  hand  the  love 
of  native  soil,  the  dominion  of  habit,  the  dread  and 
dislike  of  migration,  were  infinitely  greater.  We  are 
not  to  suppose  that  the  steady  stream  of  emigration 
to  the  New  World,  which  we  witness,  has  been 
flowing  ever  since  there  was  a  New  World,  or  even 
ever  since  we  had  prosperous  colonics.  This  move- 
ment did  not  begin  till  after  the  peace  of  1815. 
Under  the  old  colonial   system  circumstances  were 


84  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LEOT. 

quite  diflferent,  and  may  be  illustrated  by  what  we 
know  of  the  history  of  the  New  England  colonies. 
Of  these  we  learn  that  from  their  commencement  in 
1620  for  twenty  years,  until  the  meeting  of  the  Long 
Parliament,  immigration  did  indeed  flow  in  a  steady 
stream,  but  for  a  quite  special  reason,  viz.  because 
the  Anglican  Church  was  then  harsh,  and  New  Eng- 
land afforded  a  refuge  for  Puritanism  and  Brownism 
or  Independency.  Accordingly  we  are  told  that  as 
soon  as  the  Long  Parliament  met  this  stream  ceased 
to  flow,  and  that  afterwards  for  a  hundred  years  there 
was  so  little  immigration  into  New  England  from 
Old  England  that  it  was  believed  not  to  balance  the 
counter-movement  of  colonists  quitting  the  colony.^ 
These  were  circumstances  in  which,  though  there 
might  be  colonies,  there  could  be  no  Greater  Britain. 
The  material  basis  of  a  Greater  Britain  might  indeed 
be  laid — that  is,  vast  territories  might  be  occupied, 
and  rival  nations  might  be  expelled  from  them.  In 
this  material  sense  Greater  Britain  was  created  in  the 
seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries.  But  the  idea 
that  could  shape  the  material  mass  was  still  wanting. 
Towards  this  only  one  step  was  taken,  namely,  in 
laying  down  the  principle  that  colonies  did  in  some 

^  "The  accessions  which  New  England  henceforward  {i.e.  after 
1640)  received  from  abroad  were  more  than  counterbalanced  by 
perpetual  emigrations,  which  in  the  course  of  two  centuries  have 
scattered  her  sons  over  every  part  of  North  America,  and  indeed  of 
the  globe.  The  immigrants  of  the  preceding  period  had  not 
exceeded  twenty-five  thousand,  a  primitive  stock,  from  which  has 
been  derived  not  less  perhaps  than  a  fourth  part  of  the  present 
population  of  the  United  States." — Hildreth,  Hist,  of  U.  S. 
i.  p.  267. 


IV  THE  OLD  COLONIAL  SYSTEM  85 

way  belong  together  with  the  mother-country,  that 
England  did  in  some  sense  go  with  them  across  the 
sea,  and  that  they  could  not  cease  to  be  English  but 
through  a  war. 

And  what  is  true  of  the  English  colonies  in  the 
eighteenth  centuiy  is  equally  true  of  the  colonies 
of  other  States.  Greater  Spain,  Greater  Portugal, 
Greater  Holland,  and  Greater  France,  were  all,  as 
much  as  Greater  Britain,  artificial  fabrics,  wanting 
organic  unity  and  life. 

Consequently  they  were  all  short  -  lived,  and 
Greater  Britain  itself  appeared  likely  to  be  short-lived. 
It  seemed  indeed  likely  to  be  more  short-lived  than 
many  of  its  rivals.  The  Spanish  colonies  in  America, 
which  had  been  founded  a  hundred  years  before  the 
English,  did  not  break  ofi"  so  soon.  The  Declaration 
of  Independence  of  1776  was  not  only  the  most 
striking  but  also  the  first  act  of  rebellion  on  the  part 
of  colonies  against  mother-countries. 

Nor  did  Greater  Britain  ultimately  escape  this 
danger  by  any  wisdom  in  its  rulers.  When  the  utter 
weakness  of  the  old  colonial  system  had  been  ex- 
posed, we  did  not  abandon  it  and  take  up  a  better. 
A  new  Empire  gradually  grew  up  out  of  the  same 
causes  which  had  called  into  existence  the  old,  and  it 
grew  up  under  much  the  same  system.  We  had  not 
learnt  from  experience  wisdom,  but  only  despair. 
We  saw  that  under  that  system  we  could  not  per- 
manently keep  our  colonies,  but,  instead  of  inferring 
that  the  system  must  be  changed,  we  only  inferred 
that  sooner  or  later  the  colonies  must  be  lost. 


86  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

Then  came,  in  the  forties  of  this  century,  the 
victory  of  free-trade.  Among  other  restraints  upon 
trade  it  condemned  in  Mo  the  old  colonial  system. 
This  system  was  abolished,  but  at  the  same  time  the 
opinion  grew  up  that  our  colonies  were  useless,  and 
that  the  sooner  they  were  emancipated  the  better. 
And  this  doctrine  would  have  been  obviously  sound, 
if  the  general  conditions  of  the  world  had  remained 
the  same  in  the  nineteenth  century  as  they  were  in 
the  eighteenth  and  seventeenth.  Our  forefathers  had 
found  that  they  could  make  no  use  of  colonies  except 
by  extracting  trade -advantages  from  them.  What 
then  could  remain  to  the  mother-country,  when  her 
monopoly  was  resigned  ? 

There  followed  a  quiet  period,  in  which  the  very 
slender  tie  which  held  the  Empire  together  suffered 
no  strain.  In  these  favourable  circumstances  the 
natural  bond  was  strong  enough  to  prevent  a  catas- 
trophe. Englishmen  in  all  parts  of  the  world  still 
remembered  that  they  were  of  one  blood  and  one 
religion,  that  they  had  one  history  and  one  language 
and  literature.  This  was  enough,  so  long  as  neither 
colonies  nor  mother-country  were  called  upon  to  make 
very  heavy  sacrifices  each  for  the  other.  Such  a 
quiet  time  favours  the  growth  of  a  wholly  different 
view  of  the  Empire.  This  view  is  founded  upon  the 
consideration  that  distance  has  now  no  longer  the 
important  influence  that  it  had  on  political  relations. 

In  the  last  century  there  could  be  no  Greater 
Britain  in  the  true  sense  of  the  word,  because  of  the 
distance  between  the  mother-country  and  its  colonies 


IV  THE  OLD  COLONIAL  SYSTEM  87 

and  between  the  colonies  themselves.  This  impedi- 
ment exists  no  longer.  Science  has  given  to  the 
political  organism  a  new  circulation,  Avhich  is  steam, 
and  a  new  nervous  system,  which  is  electricity. 
These  new  conditions  make  it  necessary  to  reconsider 
the  whole  colonial  problem.  They  make  it  in  the 
first  place  possible  actually  to  realise  the  old  utopia 
of  a  Greater  Britain,  and  at  the  same  time  they 
make  it  almost  necessary  to  do  so.  First  they  make 
it  possible.  In  the  old  time  such  large  political 
organisms  were  only  stable  when  they  were  of  low 
type.  Thus  Greater  Spain  was  longer -lived  than 
Greater  Britain,  precisely  because  it  was  despotically 
governed.  Greater  Britain  ran  on  the  rock  of 
parliamentary  liberties,  which  were  then  impossible 
on  so  great  a  scale,  while  despotism  was  possible 
enough.  Had  it  then  been  thought  possible  to  give 
parliamentary  representation  to  our  colonists,  the 
whole  quarrel  might  easily  have  been  avoided.  But 
it  was  not  thought  possible  ;  and  why  1  Burke  gives 
you  the  answer  in  the  well-known  passage,  in  which 
he  throws  ridicule  upon  the  notion  of  summoning 
representatives  from  so  vast  a  distance.  This  notion 
has  now  ceased  at  any  rate  to  be  ridiculous,  however 
great  the  difficulties  of  detail  may  still  be.  Those 
very  colonies,  which  then  broke  off  from  us,  have 
since  given  the  example  of  a  federal  organisation,  in 
which  vast  territories,  some  of  them  thinly  peopled 
and  newly  settled,  are  held  easily  in  union  with  older 
communities,  and  the  whole  enjoys  in  the  fullest 
degree  parliamentary  freedom.     The  United  States 


88  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

have  solved  a  problem  substantially  similar  to  that, 
which  our  old  colonial  system  could  not  solve,  by 
showing  how  a  State  may  throw  off  a  constant  stream 
of  emigration,  how  from  a  fringe  of  settlement  on  the 
Atlantic  a  whole  Continent  as  far  as  the  Pacific  may 
be  peopled,  and  yet  the  doubt  never  arise  whether 
those  remote  settlements  will  not  soon  claim  their 
independence,  or  whether  they  will  bear  to  be  taxed 
for  the  benefit  of  the  whole. 

And  lastly  what  is  thus  shown  to  be  possible 
appears  now  to  be  much  more  urgently  important 
than  in  the  last  century.  For  the  same  inventions 
which  make  vast  political  unions  possible,  tend  to 
make  states  which  are  on  the  old  scale  of  magnitude 
unsafe,  insignificant,  second-rate.  If  the  United  States 
and  Russia  hold  together  for  another  half  century, 
they  will  at  the  end  of  that  time  completely  dwarf 
such  old  European  States  as  France  and  Germany, 
and  depress  them  into  a  second  class.  They  will  do 
the  same  to  England,  if  at  the  end  of  that  time 
England  still  thinks  of  herself  as  simply  a  European 
State,  as  the  old  United  Kingdom  of  Great  Britain 
and  Ireland,  such  as  Pitt  left  her.  It  would  indeed 
be  a  poor  remedy,  if  we  should  try  to  face  these  vast 
states  of  the  new  type  by  an  artificial  union  of  settle- 
ments and  islands  scattered  over  the  whole  globe, 
inhabited  by  different  nationalities,  and  connected  by 
no  tie  except  the  accident  that  they  happen  all  alike 
to  acknowledge  the  Queen's  authority.  But  I  have 
pointed  out  that  what  we  call  our  Empire  is  no  such 
artificial  fabric ;  that  it  is  not  properly,  if  we  exclude 


IV  THE  OLD  COLONIAL  SYSTEM  89 

India  from  consideration,  an  Empire  at  all ;  that  it 
is  a  vast  English  nation,  only  a  nation  so  widely 
dispersed  that  before  the  age  of  steam  and  electricity 
its  strong  natural  bonds  of  race  and  religion  seemed 
practically  dissolved  by  distance.  As  soon  then  as 
distance  is  aboHshed  by  science,  as  soon  as  it  is  proved 
by  the  examples  of  the  United  States  and  Russia 
that  political  union  over  vast  areas  has  begun  to  be 
possible,  so  soon  Greater  Britain  starts  up,  not  only 
a  reality,  but  a  robust  reality.  It  will  belong  to  the 
stronger  class  of  political  unions.  If  it  will  not  be 
stronger  than  the  United  States,  we  may  say  with 
confidence  that  it  will  be  far  stronger  than  the  great 
conglomeration  of  Slavs,  Germans,  Turcomans  and 
Armenians,  of  Greek  Christians,  Catholics,  Protestants. 
Mussulmans  and  Buddhists,  which  we  call  Russia. 


LECTUEE  V 

EFFECT  OF  THE  NEW  WORLD  ON  THE  OLD 

In  a  former  lecture  I  pointed  out  how  much  unity  is 
given  to  the  history  of  England  in  the  eighteenth 
century,  how  all  the  great  wars  of  that  time  are 
shown  to  belong  together  and  fall  into  a  connected 
series,  if  you  remark  the  single  fact  that  Greater 
Britain  during  that  period  was  establishing  itself  in 
opposition  to  Greater  France.  And  I  have  since 
proceeded  further  in  the  same  train  of  reflection,  by 
remarking  that  during  the  eighteenth  and  seven- 
teenth centuries  it  is  not  England  and  France  only 
that  have  great  colonies,  but  Spain,  Portugal,  and 
Holland  also.  You  will,  I  think,  find  it  very  helpful 
in  studying  the  history  of  those  two  centuries, 
always  to  bear  in  mind  that  throughout  most  of  that 
period  the  five  states  of  Western  Europe  all  alike  are 
not  properly  European  states  but  world-states,  and 
that  they  debate  continually  among  themselves  a 
mighty  question,  which  is  not  European  at  all,  and 
which  the  student  with  his  eye  fixed  on  Europe  is 


LECT.  V    EFFECT  OF  THE  NEW  WOULD  ON  THE  OLD   91 

too   apt  to  disregard,  namely,  the  question  of   the 
possession  of  the  New  World. 

This  obvious  fact,  sufficiently  borne  in  mind,  gives 
much  unity  to  the  political  history  of  those  nations, 
and  reduces  to  a  simple  formula  most  of  their  wars 
and  alliances.  But  I  now  proceed  to  show,  especially 
with  respect  to  England,  that  the  European  States 
were  greatly  modified,  not  only  in  their  mutual 
dealings  with  each  other,  but  internally  in  the  nature 
of  each  community,  by  their  connection  with  the 
New  World.  It  will  be  found  that  the  modern 
character  of  England,  as  it  has  come  to  be  since  the 
Middle  Ages,  may  also  be  most  briefly  d'escribed  on 
the  whole  by  saying  that  England  has  been  expand- 
ing into  Greater  Britain. 

Two  great  events  happened  within  thirty  years  of 
each  other,  the  discovery  of  the  New  World  and  the 
Reformation.  These  two  events  closely  involved 
with  two  others,  viz.  the  consolidation  of  the  great 
European  States  and  the  closing  of  the  East  by  the 
Turkish  Conquest,  caused  the  vast  change  which  we 
know  as  the  close  of  the  Middle  Ages  and  the  opening 
of  the  modern  period.  But  of  the  two  leading 
events  the  one  was  of  far  more  rapid  operation  than 
the  other.  The  Reformation  produced  its  effect  at 
once  and  in  the  very  front  of  the  stage  of  history. 
For  more  than  half  a  century  the  historical  student 
finds  himself  mainly  concerned  with  the  struggle 
between  the  Habsburg  House  and  the  Reformation, 
first  in  Germany,  where  it  is  assisted  by  France, 
then   in    the   Low   Countries,    where   it   is    helped, 


92  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot, 

sometimes  by  France,  sometimes  by  England.  Mean- 
while the  occupation  of  the  New  World  is  going  on 
in  the  background,  and  does  not  force  itself  upon  the 
attention  of  the  student  who  is  contemplating  Europe. 
The  achievements  of  Cortez  and  Pizarro  do  not  seem 
to  have  any  reaction  upon  the  European  struggle. 
And  perhaps  it  is  not  till  near  the  end  of  the  six- 
teenth century,  when  the  raids  of  Francis  Drake  and 
his  fellows  upon  the  Spanish  settlements  in  Central 
America  mainly  contributed  to  decide  Spain  to  her 
great  enterprise  against  England,  perhaps  it  is  not 
till  the  time  of  the  Spanish  Armada,  that  the  New 
World  begins  in  any  perceptible  degree  to  react 
upon  the  Pld. 

But  from  this  time  forward  European  affairs  begin 
to  be  controlled  by  two  great  causes  at  once,  viz. 
the  Reformation  and  the  New  World,  and  of  these 
the  Reformation  acts  with  diminishing  force,  and  the 
New  World  has  more  and  more  influence.  It  is 
characteristic  of  the  seventeenth  century  that  these 
two  causes  act  throughout  it  in  combination.  This 
is  illustrated,  as  I  mentioned  above,  by  Cromwell's 
policy  of  war  against  Spain,  which  is  double-faced 
and,  while  it  seems  to  be  a  blow  of  Protestantism 
against  Catholicism,  is  really  a  stroke  for  territory  in 
the  New  World,  so  that  it  results  in  the  conquest  of 
Jamaica.  It  is  illustrated  too  by  the  alliance  of 
France  and  England  against  Holland  in  1672,  when 
one  Protestant  Power  assails  another  with  the  pointed 
approbation  of  the  Cromwellian  statesman  Shaftes- 
bury, because  they  have  rival  interests  in  the  New 


V         EFFECT  OF  THE  NEW  WORLD  ON  THE  OLD        93 

World.  But  by  the  end  of  that  century  the  Reform- 
ation as  a  force  in  politics  has  declined,  and  in  the 
eighteenth  century  the  ruling  influence  is  throughout 
the  New  World.  This  is  what  gives  t6  that  century 
the  prosaic  commercial  character  which  distinguishes 
it.  The  religious  question  with  all  its  grandeur  has 
sunk  to  rest,  and  the  colonial  question,  made  up  of 
worldly  and  material  considerations,  has  taken  its 
place. 

Now  the  New  World,  considered  as  a  boundless 
territory  open  to  settlement,  would  act  in  two  ways 
upon  the  nations  of  Europe.  In  the  first  place  it 
would  have  a  purely  political  effect — that  is,  it  would 
act  upon  their  Governments.  For  so  much  debatable 
territory  would  be  a  standing  cause  of  war.  It  is 
this  action  of  the  New  World  that  we  have  been 
considering  hitherto,  while  we  have  observed  how 
mainly  the  wars  of  the  eighteenth  century,  and 
particularly  the  great  wars  of  England  and  France, 
were  kindled  by  this  cause.  But  the  New  World 
would  also  act  upon  the  Eiu-opean  communities 
themselves,  modifying  their  occupations  and  ways  of 
life,  altering  their  industrial  and  economical  char- 
acter. Thus  the  expansion  of  England  involves  its 
transformation. 

England  is  now  pre-eminently  a  maritime,  colonising 
and  industrial  country.  It  seems  to  be  the  prevalent 
opinion  that  England  always  was  so,  and  from  the 
nature  of  her  people  can  never  be  otherwise.  In 
Riickert's  poem  the  deity  that  visited  the  same  spot 
of  earth  at  intervals  of  five  hundred  years,  and  found 


94  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leOt. 

there  now  a  forest,  now  a  city,  now  a  sea,  when- 
ever he  asked  after  the  origin  of  what  he  saw, 
received  for  answer,  "It  has  always  been  so,  and 
always  will  be."  This  unhistorical  way  of  thinking, 
this  disposition  to  ascribe  an  inherent  necessity  to 
whatever  we  are  accustomed  to,  betrays  itself  in 
much  that  is  said  about  the  genius  of  the  Anglo- 
Saxon  race.  That  we  might  have  been  other  than 
we  are,  nay,  that  we  once  were  other,  is  to  us  so 
inconceivable  that  we  try  to  explain  why  we  were 
always  the  same,  before  ascertaining  by  any  inquiry 
whether  the  fact  is  so.  It  seems  to  us  clear  that 
we  are  the  great  wandering,  working,  colonising 
race,  descended  from  sea-rovers  and  Vikings.  The 
sea,  we  think,  is  ours  by  nature's  decree,  and  on 
this  highway  we  travel  to  subdue  the  earth  and  to 
people  it. 

And  yet  in  fact  it  was  only  in  the  Elizabethan  age 
that  England  began  to  discover  her  vocation  to  trade 
and  to  the  dominion  of  the  sea. 

Our  insular  position,  and  the  fact  that  our  island 
towards  the  West  and  North  looks  right  out  upon 
the  Atlantic  Ocean,  may  lead  us  to  fancy  that  the 
nation  must  always  have  been  maritime  by  the 
necessity  of  the  case.  We  entered  the  island  in 
ships,  and  afterwards  we  were  conquered  by  a  nation 
of  sea-rovers.  But  after  all  England  is  not  a  Norway ; 
it  is  not  a  country  which  has  only  narrow  strips  of 
cultivable  land,  and  therefore  forces  its  population 
to  look  to  the  sea  for  their  subsistence.  England  in 
the  time  of  the  Plantagenets  was  no  mistress  of  the 


V         EFFECT  OF  THE  NEW  WORLD  ON  THE  OLD        95 

seas ;  in  fact  she  was  scarcely  a  maritime  state  at  all. 
Occasionally  in  war-time  we  find  medieval  England 
in  possession  of  a  considerable  navy.  But  as  soon  as 
peace  arrives  the  navy  dwindles  away  again.  The 
constant  complaints  of  piracy  in  the  Channel  show 
how  little  control  England  was  able  to  exercise  even 
over  her  own  seas.  It  has  been  justly  remarked 
that,  as  the  Middle  Ages  know  of  no  standing  army, 
so,  excepting  the  case  of  some  Italian  city-states, 
they  know  of  no  standing  fleet.  Over  and  over 
again  in  those  times  this  decay  of  the  navy  recurs. 
Then  when  a  new  war  broke  out,  the  Government 
would  issue  a  general  license  to  all  merchant-ships  to 
act  as  privateers,  and  the  merchant-ships  would 
respond  to  it  by  becoming  not  merely  privateers  but 
pirates.  In  fact,  though  under  the  Plantagenets  the 
English  nation  Avas  more  warlike  in  spirit  than  it  has 
been  since,  yet  it  is  observable  that  in  those  days  its 
ambition  was  directed  much  more  to  fighting  by  land 
than  by  sea.  The  glories  of  the  English  army  of 
those  days  greatly  eclipse  those  of  the  English  navy  ; 
we  remember  the  victories  of  Crecy  and  Poitiers, 
but  we  have  forgotten  that  of  Sluys. 

The  truth  is  that  the  maritime  greatness  of 
England  is  of  much  more  modern  growth  than  most 
of  us  imagine.  It  dates  from  the  civil  wars  of  the 
seventeenth  century  and  from  the  career  of  Eobert 
Blake.  Blake's  pursuit  of  Prince  Rupert  through  the 
Straits  of  Gibraltar  up  the  eastern  coast  of  Spain  is 
said  to  have  been  the  first  appearance  of  an  English 
fleet  in  the   Mediterranean   after   the   time   of   the 


96  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect 

Crusades,  There  are  no  doubt  naval  heroes  older 
than  Blake.  There  is  Francis  Drake,  and  Richard 
Grenville,  and  John  Hawkins.  But  the  navy  of 
Elizabeth  was  only  the  English  navy  in  infancy,  and 
the  heroes  themselves  are  not  far  removed  from 
buccaneers.  Before  the  Tudor  period  we  find  only 
the  embryo  of  a  navy.  In  the  fifteenth  century 
English  naval  history,  except  during  the  short  reign 
of  Henry  V.,  shows  only  feebleness ;  before  that  too 
feebleness  is  the  rule  and  efficiency  the  exception, 
until  we  arrive  at  the  reign  of  Edward  I.,  who  was 
the  first  to  conceive  even  the  idea  of  a  standing 
navy. 

And  not  in  maritime  war  only  but  in  maritime 
discovery,  in  maritime  activity  of  all  kinds,  the  great- 
ness of  England  is  modern.  In  the  great  unrivalled 
explorations  of  the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth  centuries 
we  did  no  doubt  something,  but  we  had  no  pretension 
whatever  to  take  the  lead.  It  is  true  that  we  made 
a  promising  commence;ment.  A  ship  from  Bristol 
was  absolutely  the  first  to  touch  the  American 
Continent,  so  that  there  were  English  sailors  who 
saw  America  proper  a  year  or  so  before  Columbus 
himself.  At  that  moment  we  seemed  likely  to  rival 
Spain,  for  if  the  commander  Cabot  ^  was  no  English- 
man, neither  was  Columbus  a  Spaniard.  But  we  fell 
behind  again ;  Henry  VII.  was  unwisely  parsimonious, 

^  John  Cabot  was  an  Italian,  by  citizenship  a  "Venetian  ;  but  if 
his  son  Sebastian  was  born  after  the  father  settled  in  Bristol,  and 
if  the  son,  not  the  father,  commanded  the  ship,  the  whole  achieve- 
ment might  be  made  out  to  be  English.  The  evidence  however 
points  the  other  way.  See  the  discussion  in  Hellwald,  Sebastian 
Cabot. 


V         EFFECT  OF  THE  NEW  WORLD  ON  THE  OLD        97 

Henry  VIII.  was  caught  in  the  vortex  of  the 
Eeformation.  In  the  first  generation  of  great 
discoverers  there  is  no  English  name.  Frobisher, 
Chancellor  and  Francis  Drake  did  not  appear  on 
the  Ocean  till  Columbus  had  lain  for  half  a 
century  in  his  grave.  Among  nations  of  maritime 
renown  whether  in  war,  discovery  or  colonisation, 
before  the  time  of  the  Spanish  Armada  England 
could  not  pretend  to  take  any  high  rank.  Spain 
had  carried  off  the  prize,  less  by  merit  than  by 
the  good  fortune  which  sent  her  Columbus,  but  the 
nation  which  had  really  deserved  it  was  beyond  dis- 
pute Portugal,  which  indeed  had  almost  reason  to 
complain  of  the  glorious  intrusion  of  Columbus. 
Even  against  him  she  might  urge  that,  if  the  object 
was  to  find  the  Indies,  she  took  the  right  way  and 
found  them,  while  he  took  the  wrong  way  and 
missed  them.^  After  these  nations,  and  in  quite  a 
lower  class,  might  be  placed  England  and  France,  and 
I  do  not  know  that  England  would  have  a  right  to 
stand  before  France.  This  is  somewhat  disguised  in 
our  histories  owing  to  the  natural  desire  of  the 
historians  to  make  the  most  of  our  actual  achieve- 
ments. In  later  times,  after  our  maritime  supremacy 
had  once  begun,  we  should  be  surprised  at  any  nation 
competing  with  us  for  the  first  place,  whereas  we  are 
content  to  appear  as  spirited  aspirants  venturing  to 

1  Even  if  it  were  answered  in  hia  behalf  that  it  is  better  to  be 
wrong  and  find  America  than  to  be  right  and  find  India,  Portugal 
might  answer  that  she  did  both,  since  in  the  second  voyage  made 
from  Lisbon  to  India  she  discovered  Brazil,  only  eight  years  after 
the  first  voy^e  of  Columbus,  and  would  undoubtedly  have 
discovered  it,  if  Columbus  had  never  been  bom. 
U 


98  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

contest  the  pre-eminence  of  Spain  after  she  has 
enjoyed  it  for  the  best  part  of  a  century.  And  even 
at  the  end  of  the  sixteenth  century,  when  a  large 
part  of  the  American  Continent  has  been  carved  out 
in  Spanish  vice-royalties,  and  Portugal  has  sent  out 
governors  to  rule  in  the  Indian  Ocean,  when  Spanish 
missionaries  have  visited  Japan,  when  the  great  poet 
of  Portugal  has  led  a  literary  career  for  sixteen  years 
and  written  an  epic  poem  in  regions  which  to  former 
poets  had  seemed  fabulous,  even  as  late  as  this  the 
English  are  quite  beginners  in  the  maritime  career, 
and  have  as  yet  no  settlements. 

But  from  naval  affairs  let  us  turn  to  manufactures 
and  commerce.  Here  again  we  shall  find  that  it  is 
not  a  natural  vocation,  founded  upon  inherent 
aptitudes,  that  has  given  us  our  success  in  these 
pursuits.  In  manufactures  our  success  depends 
upon  our  peculiar  relation  to  the  great  producing 
countries  of  the  globe.  The  vast  harvests  of  the 
world  are  reaped  in  countries  where  land  is  wide  and 
population  generally  thin.  But  those  countries 
cannot  manufacture  their  own  raw  materials,  because 
all  hands  are  engaged  in  producing  and  there  is  no 
surplus  population  to  be  employed  in  manufacture. 
The  cotton  of  America  and  wool  of  Australia  therefore 
come  to  England,  where  not  only  such  a  surplus 
population  exists,  but  where  also  the  great  standing 
instrument  of  manufacture,  coal,  is  found  in  abund- 
ance and  near  the  coast.  Now  all  this  is  modern, 
most  of  it  very  modern.  The  reign  of  coal  began 
with  machinery,  that  is,  in  the  latter  half  of  the 


V         EFFECT  OF  THE  NEW  WORLD  ON  THE  OLD        99 

eighteenth  century.  The  vast  tracts  of  production 
were  not  heard  of  till  the  New  World  had  been  laid 
open,  and  could  not  be  used  freely  till  two  centuries 
and  a  half  later,  when  railways  were  introduced. 
Evidently  therefore  the  basis  of  our  manufacturing 
greatness  could  not  be  laid  till  very  recent  times. 
The  England  of  the  Plantagenets  occupied  a  wholly 
different  economical  position.  Manufactures  were 
not  indeed  wanting,  but  the  nation  was  as  yet  so  far 
from  being  remarked  for  its  restless  industry  and 
practical  talent,  that  a  description  written  in  the 
fifteenth  century  says  that  the  English,  "being 
seldom  fatigued  with  hard  labour,  lead  a  life  more 
spiritual  and  refined."  ^  In  the  main  England  at  that 
time  subsisted  upon  its  lucrative  intercourse  (magnus 
intercursus)  with  Flanders.  She  produced  the  wool 
which  was  manufactured  there  ;  she  was  to  Flanders 
what  Australia  is  now  to  the  West  Riding.  London 
was  as  Sydney,  Ghent  and  Bruges  were  as  Leeds  and 
Bradford. 

This  continued  in  the  main  to  be  the  case  till  the 
Elizabethan  age.  But  then,  about  the  time  that  the 
maritime  greatness  of  England  was  beginning,  she 
began  also  to  be  a  great  manufacturing  country.  For 
the  manufactures  of  Flanders  perished  in  the  great 
catastrophe  of  the  religious  war  of  the  Low  Countries 
with  Spain.     Flemish  manufacturers  swarmed  over 

1  Fortescue,  quoted  by  Mr.  Cunningham,  Growth  of  English 
Industry  and  Commerce,  p.  217.  Besides  being  indolent  and 
contemplative,  the  Englishman  of  the  fifteenth  century  y/as  pre- 
eminent in  urbanity  and  totally  devoid  of  domestic  aflfection  !  See 
Gairdner's  Paston  Letters,  vol.  iii.  Intr.  p.  Ixiii. 


100  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

into  England,  and  gave  a  new  life  to  the  industry 
which  had  long  had  its  centre  at  Norwich.  There 
began  what  may  be  called  the  Norwich  period  of  our 
manufacturing  history,  which  lasted  through  the 
whole  seventeenth  century.  The  peculiarity  of  it 
was  that  in  this  period  England  manufactured  her 
own  product,  wool.  Instead  of  being  mainly  a  pro- 
ducing country  as  before,  or  mainly  a  manufacturing 
country  as  now,  she  was  a  country  manufacturing 
what  she  herself  produced. 

So  much  for  manufactures.  But  the  present  in- 
dustrial greatness  of  England  is  composed  only  in 
part  of  her  greatness  in  manufacture.  She  has  also 
the  carrying  trade  of  the  world,  and  is  therefore  its 
exchange  and  business  -  centre.  Now  this  carrying 
trade  has  come  to  her  as  the  great  maritime  country ; 
it  is  therefore  superfluous  to  remark  that  she  had  it 
not  in  the  Middle  Ages,  when  she  had  not  yet 
become  a  maritime  country.  Indeed  in  those  times  a 
carrying  trade  can  hardly  be  spoken  of.  It  implies 
a  great  sea-traffic,  and  a  great  sea-traffic  did  not  begin 
till  the  New  World  was  thrown  open.  Before  that 
event  business  had  its  centre  in  the  central  countries 
of  Europe,  in  Italy  and  the  Imperial  Cities  of 
Germany.  The  great  business  men  of  the  fifteenth 
century  were  the  Medici  of  Florence,  the  Fuggers  of 
Augsburg,  the  founders  of  the  Bank  of  St.  George  at 
Genoa. 

In  the  Middle  Ages  England  was,  from  the  point 
of  view  of  business,  not  an  advanced,  but  on  the 
whole  a  backward  country.      She  must  have  been 


V        EFFECT  OF  THE  NEW  WORLD  ON  THE  OLD       101 

despised  in  the  chief  commercial  countries;  as  now 
she  herself  looks  upon  the  business-system  and  the 
banking  of  countries  like  Germany  and  even  France 
as  old-fashioned  compared  to  her  own,  so  in  the 
Middle  Ages  the  Italians  must  have  looked  upon 
England.  With  their  city-life,  wide  business-con- 
nections and  acuteness  in  affairs,  they  must  have 
classed  England,  along  with  France,  among  the  old- 
world,  agricultural,  and  feudal  countries,  which  lay 
outside  the  main-current  of  the  ideas  of  the  time. 

Nor  when  the  great  change  took  place,  which  left 
Italy  and  Germany  in  their  turn  stranded,  and  turned 
the  whole  course  of  business  into  another  channel, 
are  we  to  suppose  that  England  stepped  at  once  into 
their  place.  Their  successor  was  Holland.  Through 
a  great  part  of  the  seventeenth  century  the  carrying 
trade  of  the  world  was  in  the  hands  of  the  Dutch, 
and  Amsterdam  was  the  exchange  of  the  world.  It 
is  against  this  Dutch  monopoly  that  England  struggles 
in  Cromwell's  time  and  in  the  earlier  part  of  the 
reign  of  Charles  II.  Not  till  late  in  that  century 
does  Holland  begin  to  show  signs  of  defeat.  Not 
till  then  does  England  decidedly  take  the  lead  in 
commerce. 

And  thus,  if  we  put  together  all  the  items,  we 
arrive  at  the  conclusion  that  the  England  we  know, 
the  supreme  maritime  commercial  and  industrial 
Power,  is  quite  of  modern  growth,  that  it  did  not 
clearly  exhibit  its  principal  features  till  the  eighteenth 
century,  and  that  the  seventeenth  century  is  the 
period  when   it  was  gradually  assuming  this  form. 


102  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LECT. 

If  we  ask  when  it  began  to  do  so,  the  answer  is 
particularly  easy  and  distinct.  It  was  in  the  Elizar 
bethan  Age. 

Now  this  was  the  time  when  the  New  World 
began  to  exert  its  influence,  and  thus  the  most 
obvious  facts  suggest  that  England  owes  its  modern 
character  and  its  peculiar  greatness  from  the  outset 
to  the  New  World.  It  is  not  the  blood  of  the  Vikings 
that  makes  us  rulers  of  the  sea,  nor  the  industrial 
genius  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  that  makes  us  great  in 
manufactures  and  commerce,  but  a  much  more  special 
circumstance,  which  did  not  arise  till  for  many 
centuries  we  had  been  agricultural  or  pastoral,  war- 
like, and  indifferent  to  the  sea. 

In  the  school  of  Carl  Ritter  much  has  been  said  ^ 
of  three  stages  of  civilisation  determined  by  geograph- 
ical conditions,  the  potamic,  which  clings  to  rivers,  the 
thalassic,  which  grows  up  around  inland  seas,  and 
lastly  the  oceanic.  This  theory  looks  as  if  it  had  been 
suggested  by  the  change  which  followed  the  discovery 
of  the  New  World,  when  indeed  European  civilisation 
passed  from  the  thalassic  to  the  oceanic  stage.  Till 
then  trade  had  clung  to  the  Mediterranean  Sea.  Till 
then  the  Ocean  had  been  a  limit,  a  boundary,  not  a 
pathway.  There  had  been  indeed  a  certain  amount 
of  intercourse  across  the  narrow  seas  of  the  North, 
which  had  nourished  the  trade  of  the  Hanseatic 
League.  But  in  the  main  the  Mediterranean  con- 
tinued to  be  the  headquarters  of  industry  as  of 
civilisation,  and  the  Middle  Age  moved  so  far  in  the 
*  See  Peschel,  Abhandlungen  zur  Erd-und  Volkerkunde,  p.  398. 


V        EFFECT  OF  THE  NEW  WOULD  ON  THE  OLD       103 

groove  of  the  ancient  world  that  Italy  in  both  seemed 
to  have  a  natural  superiority  over  the  countries  on 
this  side  of  the  Alps.  France  and  England  had  no 
doubt  advanced  greatly,  but  to  the  Italian  in  the 
fifteenth  century  they  still  seemed  comparatively 
barbarous,  intellectually  provincial  and  second-rate. 
The  reason  of  this  was  that  for  practical  purposes 
they  were  inland,  while  Italy  reaped  the  benefit  of 
the  civilising  sea.  The  greatness  of  Florence  rested 
upon  woollen  manufactures,  that  of  Venice,  Pisa  and 
Genoa  upon  foreign  trade  and  dependencies,  and  all 
this  at  a  time  when  France  and  England  comparatively 
were  given  up  to  feudalism  and  rusticity.  By  the 
side  of  the  Italian  republics,  France  and  England 
showed  like  Thessaly  and  Macedonia  in  comparison 
with  Athens  and  Corinth. 

Now  Columbus  and  the  Portuguese  altered  all  this 
by  substituting  the  Atlantic  Ocean  for  the  Mediter- 
ranean Sea  as  the  highway  of  commerce.  From 
that  moment  the  reign  of  Italy  is  over.  The  relation 
of  cause  and  effect  is  here  in  some  degree  concealed 
by  the  misfortunes  which  happened  to  Italy  at  the 
same  time.  The  political  fall  of  Italy  happened 
accidentally  just  at  the  same  moment.  The  foreigner 
crossed  the  Alps;  Italy  became  a  battlefield  in  the 
great  struggle  of  France  and  Spain ;  she  was  con- 
quered, partitioned,  enslaved  ;  and  her  glory  never 
revived  afterwards.  Such  a  catastrophe  and  its 
obvious  cause,  foreign  invasion,  blinds  us  to  all  minor 
influences,  which  might  have  been  working  to  produce 
the  same  eff"ect  at  the  same  time.     But  assuredly,  had 


104  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lbct. 

no  foreign  invasion  taken  place,  Italy  would  just  then 
have  entered  on  a  period  of  decline.  The  hidden 
source  which  fed  her  energy  and  glory  was  dried  up 
by  the  discovery  of  the  New  World.  She  might  be 
compared  to  one  of  those  seaports  on  the  coast  of 
Kent  from  which  the  sea  has  receded.  Where  there 
had  once  been  life  and  movement,  silence  and  vacancy 
must  have  set  in  throughout  the  great  city  republics 
of  Italy,  even  if  no  stranger  had  crossed  the  Alps. 
The  Mediterranean  Sea  had  not  indeed  receded,  but 
it  had  lost  once  for  all  the  character  which  it  had 
had  almost  from  the  days  of  the  Odyssey.  It  had 
ceased  to  be  the  central  sea  of  human  intercourse  and 
civilisation,  the  chief,  nay,  almost  the  one  sea  of 
history.  It  so  happened  that,  soon  after  commerce 
began  to  cover  the  Atlantic,  it  was  swept  out  of  the 
Mediterranean  by  the  besom  of  the  Turkish  sea-power. 
Thus  Eanke  remarks  that  the  trade  of  Barcelona 
seemed  to  be  little  affected  by  the  new  discoveries, 
but  that  it  sank  rapidly  from  about  1529,  in  conse- 
quence of  the  maritime  predominance  of  the  Turks 
caused  by  the  successes  of  Barbarossa,  the  league  of 
France  with  Solyman,  and  the  foundation  of  the 
Barbary  States.  So  clearly  had  the  providential 
edict  gone  forth  that  European  civilisation  should 
cease  to  be  thalassic  and  should  become  oceanic. 

The  great  result  was  that  the  centre  of  movement 
and  intelligence  began  to  pass  from  the  centre  of 
Europe  to  its  Western  Coast.  Civilisation  moves 
away  from  Italy  and  Germany ;  where  it  will  settle 
is  not  yet  clear,  but  certainly  farther  west.      See  how 


V       EFFECT  OF  THE  NEW  WORLD  ON  THE  OLD       105 

strikingly  this  change  stands  out  from  the  history 
of  the  sixteenth  century.  At  the  beginning  of  that 
century  all  the  genius  in  the  world  seems  to  live  in 
Italy  or  Germany.  The  golden  age  of  modern  art  is 
passing  in  the  first  country,  but  if  there  are  any  rivals 
to  the  Italian  painters  they  are  German,  and  Michael 
Angelo  is  obliged  at  least  to  reason  with  those  who 
prefer  the  maniera  tedesca.  Meanwhile  the  Reforma- 
tion belongs  to  Germany.  For  France  and  England 
in  those  days  it  seems  sufiicient  glory  to  have  given  a 
welcome  to  the  Renaissance  and  to  the  Reformation. 
But  gradually  in  the  latter  part  of  the  sixteenth 
century  we  become  aware  that  civilisation  is  shifting 
its  headquarters.  Italy  and  Germany  are  first 
rivalled  and  then  eclipsed ;  gradually  we  grow  accus- 
tomed to  the  thought  that  great  things  are  rather  to 
be  looked  for  in  other  countries.  In  the  seven- 
teenth century  almost  all  genius  and  greatness  is 
to  be  found  in  the  western  or  maritime  states  of 
Europe. 

Now  these  are  the  states  which  were  engaged  in 
the  struggle  for  the  New  World.  Spain,  Portugal, 
France,  Holland  and  England  have  the  same  sort  of 
position  with  respect  to  the  Atlantic  Ocean  that 
Greece  and  Italy  had  in  antiquity  with  respect  to  the 
Mediterranean.  And  they  begin  to  show  a  similar 
superiority  in  intelligence.  Vast  problems  of  conquest, 
colonisation  and  commerce  occupy  their  minds,  which 
before  had  vegetated  in  a  rustic  monotony.  I  have 
already  shown  you  at  length  what  an  efTect  this 
change  had   upon  the  English    nation.      The  cfi"ect 


106  EXPANSION  OP  ENGLAND  lect. 

produced  upon  the  Dutch  was  quite  as  striking  and 
much  more  rapid.  The  Golden  Age  of  Holland  is 
the  first  half  of  the  seventeenth  century.  Let  us 
examine  for  a  moment  the  causes  which  produced  its 
prosperity. 

The  Low  Countries  which  revolted  against  Philip 
II.  of  Spain  were,  as  you  know,  not  merely  the  seven 
provinces  which  afterwards  made  the  Dutch  Eepublic 
and  now  make  the  Dutch  Monarchy,  but  those  other 
provinces  which  now  make  the  kingdom  of  Belgium. 
It  was  the  latter  group  which  at  the  time  of  the 
rebellion  were  most  prosperous.  They  were  the 
great  manufacturing  region,  the  Lancashire  or  West 
Eiding  of  the  Middle  Ages.  The  former  group,  the 
Dutch  provinces,  were  then  of  much  less  importance. 
They  were  maritime  and  chiefly  occupied  in  the 
herring  fishery.  Now  the  result  of  the  Eebellion 
was  that  Spain  was  able  to  retain  possession  of  the 
Belgian  group,  which  from  this  time  is  known  as  the 
Spanish  Low  Countries,  but  she  was  not  able  to  hold 
the  Dutch  group,  which,  after  a  war  which  seemed 
interminable,  she  was  forced  to  leave  to  their  inde- 
pendence. Now  during  the  struggle  the  prosperity 
of  the  Belgian  Provinces,  as  I  have  pointed  out,  was 
ruined.  The  Flemish  manufacturers  emigrated  and 
founded  the  woollen  manufacture  of  England.  But 
the  maritime  provinces,  poorer  at  the  outset,  instead 
of  being  ruined  grew  rich  during  the  war,  and  had 
become,  before  it  was  ended,  the  wonder  and  the 
great  commercial  state  of  the  world.  How  was  this  t 
It  was  because  they  were  maritime,  and  because  their 


V        EFFECT  OF  THE  NEW  WORLD   ON  THE  OLL       107 

sea  was  the  highway  which  led  to  the  New  World. 
As  they  had  devoted  themselves  earlier  to  the  sea, 
they  had  the  start  of  the  English,  and  their  war  with 
the  Spaniards  proved  actually  an  advantage  to  them, 
because  it  threw  open  to  their  attack  all  the  thinly- 
peopled  ill-defended  American  Empire  of  Spain.  The 
world  was  astonished  to  see  a  petty  state  with  a 
barren  soil  and  insignificant  population,  not  only  hold 
its  own  against  the  great  Spanish  Empire,  but  in  the 
midst  of  this  unequal  contest  found  a  great  colonial 
Empire  for  itself  in  both  hemispheres.  Meanwhile 
the  intellectual  stimulus,  which  the  sea  had  begun 
to  give  to  these  "Western  States,  was  nowhere  more 
manifest  than  in  Holland.  This  same  small  popula- 
tion took  the  lead  in  scholarship  as  in  commerce, 
welcomed  Lipsius,  Scaliger  and  Descartes,  and  pro- 
duced Grotius  at  the  same  time  as  Piet  Hein  and  Van 
Tromp. 

This  is  the  most  startling  single  instance  of  the 
action  of  the  New  World.  The  efi"ects  produced  in 
Holland  were  nothing  like  so  momentous  as  those 
which  I  have  traced  in  England,  for  the  greatness  of 
Holland,  wanting  a  basis  sufficiently  broad,  was  short- 
lived, but  they  were  more  sudden  and  more  evidently 
referable  to  this  single  cause. 

Such  then  was  the  effect  of  the  New  World  on 
the  Old.  It  is  visible  not  merely  in  the  wars  and 
alliances  of  the  time,  but  also  in  the  economic  growth 
and  transformation  of  the  Western  States  of  Europe. 
Civilisation  has  often  been  powerfully  promoted  by 
some  great  enterprise  in  which  several  generations 


108  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

continuously  take  part.  Such  was  the  war  of  Europe 
and  Asia  to  the  ancient  Greeks;  such  the  Crusades 
in  the  Middle  Ages.  Such  then  for  the  Western 
States  of  Europe  in  recent  centuries  has  been  the 
struggle  for  the  New  World.  It  is  this  more  than 
anything  else  which  has  placed  these  nations,  where 
they  never  were  before,  in  the  van  of  intellectual  pro- 
gress, and  especially  it  is  by  her  success  in  this  field 
that  our  own  country  has  acquired  her  peculiar 
greatness. 

I  will  conclude  this  lecture  with  some  remarks  on 
the  large  causes  which,  in  the  struggle  of  five  states, 
left  the  final  victory  in  the  hands  of  England. 
Among  these  five  we  have  seen  that  Spain  and 
Portugal  had  the  start  by  a  whole  century,  and  that 
Holland  was  in  the  field  before  England.  Afterwards 
for  about  a  century  France  and  England  contended 
for  the  New  World  on  tolerably  equal  terms.  Yet 
now  of  all  these  states  England  alone  remains  in 
possession  of  a  great  and  commanding  colonial  power. 
Why  is  this? 

We  may  observe  that  Holland  and  Portugal 
laboured  under  the  disadvantage  of  too  small  a  basis. 
The  decline  of  Holland  had  obvious  causes,  which 
have  often  been  pointed  out.  For  her  suflferiugs  in  a 
war  of  eighty  years  with  Spain  she  found  the  com- 
pensations I  have  just  described.  But  when  this 
was  followed,  first  by  naval  wars  with  England,  and 
then  by  a  struggle  with  France  which  lasted  half  a 
century,  and  she  had  now  England  for  a  rival  on 
the  seas,  she  succumbed.     At  the  beginning  of  the 


V        EFFECT  OF  THE  NEW  WORLD  ON  THE  OLD       109 

eighteenth  century  she  shows  symptoms  of  decay,  and 
at  the  Treaty  of  Utrecht  she  lays  down  her  arms, 
victorious  indeed,  but  fatally  disabled. 

The  Portuguese  met  with  a  diflFerent  misfortune. 
From  the  outset  they  had  recognised  the  insufficiency 
of  their  resources,  regretting  that  they  had  not  been 
content  with  a  less  ambitious  course  of  acquisition  on 
the  northern  coast  of  Africa.  In  1580  they  suffered 
a  blow  such  as  has  not  fallen  on  any  other  of  the 
still  existing  European  states.  Portugal  with  all  her 
world-wide  dependencies  and  commercial  stations  fell 
under  the  yoke  of  Spain,  and  underwent  a  sixty 
years'  captivity.  In  this  period  her  colonial  Empire, 
which  by  becoming  Spanish  was  laid  open  to  the 
attacks  of  the  Dutch,  suffered  greatly ;  Portuguese 
writers  accuse  Spain  of  having  witnessed  their  losses 
with  pleasure,  and  of  having  made  a  scapegoat  of 
Portugal ;  certain  it  is  that  the  discontent  which  led 
to  the  insurrection  of  1640,  and  founded  a  new 
Portugal  under  the  House  of  Bragan^a,  was  mainly 
caused  by  these  colonial  losses.  Yet  the  insurrection 
itself  cost  her  something  more  in  foreign  possessions ; 
she  paid  the  Island  of  Bombay  for  the  help  of 
England.  Nor  could  the  second  Portugal  ever  rival 
the  first,  that  nurse  of  Prince  Henry,  Bartholomew 
Diaz,  Vasco  da  Gama,  Magelhaens  and  Camoens, 
which  has  quite  a  peculiar  glory  in  the  history  of 
Europe. 

Be  it  remarked  in  passing  that  this  passage  also  of 
the  history  of  the  seventeenth  century  shows  us  the 
New  World   reacting  on  the  Old.     As  the  rise  of 


110  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LECT. 

Holland,  the  great  occurrence  of  its  first  years,  so  the 
Revolution  of  Portugal,  which  occupies  the  middle  of 
it,  is  caused  by  the  influence  of  the  colonies. 

As  to  the  ill-success  of  Spain  and  France,  it  would 
no  doubt  be  idle  to  suppose  that  any  one  cause  will 
fully  explain  it.  But  perhaps  one  large  cause  may  be 
named  which  in  both  cases  contributed  most  to  pro- 
duce the  result. 

Spain  lost  her  colonial  Empire  only,  as  it  were,  the 
other  day.  Having  founded  it  a  century  earlier,  she 
retained  it  nearly  half  a  century  later  than  England 
retained  her  first  Empire.  Compared  to  England, 
she  has  been  inferior  only  in  not  having  continued  to 
found  new  colonies.  And  this  was  the  effect  of  that 
strange  decay  of  vitality  which  overtook  Spain  in  the 
latter  half  of  the  sixteenth  century.  The  decline  of 
population  and  the  ruin  of  finance  dried  up  in  her 
every  power,  that  of  colonisation  included. 

No  similar  decline  is  observable  in  France.  France 
lost  her  colonies  in  a  series  of  unsuccessful  wars,  and 
perhaps  you  may  think  that  it  is  not  necessary  to 
inquire  further,  and  that  the  fortune  of  war  explains 
everything.  But  I  think  I  discern  that  both  States 
were  guilty  of  the  same  error  of  policy,  which  in  the 
end  mainly  contributed  to  their  failure.  It  may  be 
said  of  both  that  they  "  had  too  many  irons  in  the 
fire." 

There  was  this  fundamental  difi'erence  between 
Spain  and  France  on  the  one  side  and  England  on 
the  other,  that  Spain  and  France  were  deeply  involved 
in  the  struggles  of  Europe,  from  which  England  has 


V        EFFECT  OF  THE  NEW  WOKLD  ON  THE  OLD       111 

always  been  able  to  hold  herself  aloof.  In  fact,  as  an 
island,  England  is  distinctly  nearer  for  practical  pur- 
poses to  the  New  World,  and  almost  belongs  to  it,  or 
at  least  has  the  choice  of  belonging  at  her  pleasure  to 
the  New  World  or  to  the  Old.  Spain  might  perhaps 
have  had  the  same  choice,  but  for  her  conquests  in 
Italy  and  for  the  fatal  marriage  which,  as  it  were, 
wedded  her  to  Germany.  In  that  same  sixteenth 
century  in  which  she  was  colonising  the  New  World, 
Spain  was  merged  at  home  in  the  complex  Spanish 
Empire,  which  was  doomed  beforehand  to  decline, 
because  it  could  never  raise  a  revenue  proportioned 
to  its  responsibilities.  It  was  almost  bankrupt  when 
Charles  V.  abdicated,  though  it  could  then  draw  upon 
the  splendid  prosperity  of  the  Netherlands  ;  when, 
soon  after,  it  alienated  this  province,  lost  the  poorer 
half  of  it  and  ruined  the  richer,  when  it  engaged  in 
chronic  war  with  France,  when  after  eighty  years  of 
war  with  the  Dutch  it  entered  upon  a  quarter  of  a 
century  of  war  with  Portugal,  it  could  not  but  sink, 
as  it  did,  into  bankruptcy  and  political  decrepitude. 
These  overwhelming  burdens,  coupled  with  a  want  of 
industrial  aptitude  in  the  Spanish  people,  whose 
temperament  had  been  formed  in  a  permanent  war 
of  religion,  produced  the  result  that  the  nation  to 
which  a  new  world  had  been  given  could  never 
rightly  use  or  profit  by  the  gift. 

As  to  France,  it  is  still  more  manifest  that  she  lost 
the  New  World  because  she  was  always  divided 
between  a  policy  of  colonial  extension  and  a  policy  of 
European  conquest.     If  we  compare  together  those 


112  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

seven  great  wars  between  1688  and  1815,  we  shall 
be  struck  with  the  fact  that  most  of  them  are  double 
wars,  that  they  have  one  aspect  as  between  England 
and  France  and  another  as  between  France  and 
Germany.  It  is  the  double  policy  of  France  that 
causes  this,  and  it  is  France  that  suffers  by  it. 
England  has  for  the  most  part  a  single  object  and 
wages  a  single  war,  but  France  wages  two  wars  at 
once  for  two  distinct  objects.  When  Chatham  said 
he  would  conquer  America  in  Germany,  he  indicated 
that  he  saw  the  mistake  which  France  committed  by 
dividing  her  forces,  and  that  he  saw  how,  by  subsidis- 
ing Frederick,  to  make  France  exhaust  herself  in 
Germany,  while  her  possessions  in  America  passed 
defenceless  into  our  hands.  Napoleon  in  like  manner 
is  distracted  between  the  New  World  and  the  Old. 
He  would  humble  England;  he  would  repair  the 
colonial  and  Indian  losses  of  his  country.  But  he 
finds  himself  conquering  Germany  and  at  last  invad- 
ing Eussia.  His  comfort  is  that  through  Germany  he 
can  strike  at  English  trade,  and  through  Russia 
perhaps  make  his  way  to  India. 

England  has  not  been  thus  distracted  between  two 
objects.  Connected  but  slightly  with  the  European 
system  since  she  evacuated  France  in  the  fifteenth 
century,  she  has  not  since  then  lived  in  chronic  war 
with  her  neighbours.  She  has  not  hankered  after 
the  Imperial  Crown  or  guaranteed  the  Treaty  of 
Westphalia,  When  Napoleon  by  his  Continental 
System  shut  her  out  from  Europe,  she  showed  that 
she  could  do  without  Europe,     Hence  her  hands  have 


V        EFFECT  OF  THE  NEW  WORLD  ON  THE  OLD       113 

always  been  free,  while  trade  of  itself  inevitably 
drew  her  thoughts  in  the  direction  of  the  New  World. 
In  the  long  rim  this  advantage  has  been  decisive. 
She  has  not  had  to  maintain  a  European  Ascendency, 
as  Spain  and  France  have  had ;  on  the  other  hand 
she  has  not  had  to  withstand  such  an  Ascendency 
by  mortal  conflict  within  her  own  territory,  as 
Holland  and  Portugal,  and  Spain  also,  have  been 
forced  to  do.  Hence  nothing  has  interrupted  her  or 
interfered  with  her,  to  draw  her  off  from  the  quiet 
progress  of  her  colonial  settlements.  In  one  word, 
out  of  the  five  states  which  competed  for  the  New 
World  success  has  fallen  to  that  one — not  which 
showed  at  the  outset  the  strongest  vocation  for 
colonisation,  not  which  surpassed  the  others  in  daring 
or  invention  or  energy — but  to  that  one  which  waa 
least  hampered  by  the  Old  World. 


LECTURE  VI 


COMMERCE  AND  WAR 


] 


Competition  for  the  New  World  between  the  five 
western  maritime  States  of  Europe  :  this  is  a  formula 
which  sums  up  a  great  part  of  the  history  of  the 
seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries.  It  is  one  of 
those  generalisations  which  escape  us  so  long  as  we 
study  history  only  in  single  states. 

Much  would  be  gained  if  the  student  of  history 
would  look  at  modern  Europe  as  he  has  already  the 
habit  of  looking  at  ancient  Greece.  Here  he  has 
constantly  before  him  three  or  four  different  states  at 
once — Athens,  Sparta,  Thebes,  Argos,  not  to  mention 
Macedonia  and  Persia,  and  is  led  to  make  most 
instructive  comparisons  and  most  useful  reflections 
upon  large  general  tendencies.  This  is  entirely 
owing  to  the  accident  that  Greece  was  not  a  State 
but  a  complex  of  States,  which  fact  our  historians  do 
not  perceive  clearly  enough  to  conclude,  as  in  con- 
sistency they  ought,  that  they  ought  not  to  write  a 
history  of  Greece  at  all,  but  separate   histories  of 


LECT.  yi  COMMERCE  AND  WAR  115 

Athens,  Sparta,  etc.  Let  me  ask  those  of  you  who 
know  Grecian  history  to  apply  to  these  Western 
States  the  mode  of  conceiving  to  which  you  have 
accustomed  yourselves.  You  have  been  in  the  habit 
of  thinking  of  a  cluster  of  States  gathered  round  a 
common  sea,  which  is  studded  with  islands,  and 
which  has  on  the  other  side  of  it  large  territories 
imperfectly  known  and  inhabited  by  strange  races. 
You  have  thought  of  all  these  States  together,  and 
not  merely  of  each  by  itself ;  you  have  traced  the 
general  results  produced  upon  the  Hellenic  world  as 
a  whole  by  all  the  intricate  play  of  interests  between 
the  several  Hellenic  city-states.  Now  the  five  States 
we  have  in  view — Spain,  Portugal,  France,  Holland 
and  England — were  ranged  in  like  manner  on  the 
North-Eastern  shore  of  the  Atlantic  Ocean,  and  had 
in  like  manner  a  common  interest  in  what  that 
Ocean  contained  or  hid.  If  the  States  seem  to  you 
so  large,  the  Ocean  so  boundless,  and  the  settlements 
so  scattered  that  you  cannot  bring  them  into  one 
view,  make  an  effort,  bring  them  into  the  same  map, 
and  draw  the  map  on  a  small  scale.  But  your  great 
effort  must  be  to  raise  your  head  above  the  current 
of  mere  chronological  narrative,  to  apply  a  fixed 
principle  to  the  selection  of  facts,  grouping  them  not 
by  nearness  in  time,  nor  by  their  personal  biographical 
connection,  but  by  the  internal  affinity  of  causation. 
This  great  struggle  of  five  States  for  the  New  World 
differs  from  the  struggles  of  those  old  Greek  States 
in  thisj  that  it  is  not  isolated.  It  was  superinduced 
by  the  discovery  of  Columbus  upon  other  struggles, 


116  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

themselves  sufficiently  complicated,  which  were  going 
on  within  the  European  States;  in  particular  it  is 
entangled  with  the  great  religious  struggle  of  the 
Eef ormation.  Altogether  what  a  tangled  web !  Now 
in  a  case  like  this  what  shall  science  do  1  Surely  the 
first  thing  will  be  to  separate  and  arrange  together  all 
the  effects  whioh  can  be  traced  to  any  one  cause.  In 
order  to  do  this  it  must  evidently  neglect  chrono- 
logical order ;  it  must  break  the  fetters  of  narrative. 
Following  this  method,  it  will  see  in  the  sixteenth, 
seventeenth,  and  eighteenth  centuries,  as  I  have 
pointed  out,  two  grand  causes,  each  followed  by  its 
multitude  of  effects,  viz.  the  Reformation  and  the 
attraction  of  the  New  World;  these  two  grand 
causes  it  will  study  separately,  tracing  each  through 
the  long  series  of  effects  produced  by  it,  and  then 
perhaps,  but  not  till  then,  it  will  consider  the  mutual 
action  of  the  two  causes  upon  each  other.  It  is  our 
business  at  present  to  consider  separately  the  effects 
produced  on  the  five  Western  States  by  the  attraction 
of  the  New  World. 

Now  why  should  the  New  World  have  produced 
any  further  eflfect  upon  those  States  than  simply  to 
rouse  them  to  a  new  commercial  activity,  and  perhaps 
more  gradually  to  enlarge  their  ideas  by  enlarging 
their  knowledge  1  That  it  did  produce  this  latter 
effect  I  explained  in  the  last  lecture  by  pointing  out 
how  in  the  course  of  the  sixteenth  century  the  centre 
of  civilisation  moves  from  the  Mediterranean  to  the 
neighbourhood  of  the  Atlantic,  so  that,  whereas  in 
the  earlier  years  of  it  the  eye  turns  always  to  Italy  or 


VI  COMMERCE  AND  WAR  117 

Germany,  where  tke  Kaphaels  and  Michael  Angelos, 
the  Ariostos  and  Macchiavelli's,  the  Diirers  and 
Hiittens  and  Luthers  Hve,  at  the  end  of  it  and  in  the 
seventeenth  century  the  eye  turns  just  as  naturally 
Westward  and  Northward.  We  see  Cervantes  and 
Calderon  in  Spain,  Shakspeare  and  Spenser  and 
Bacon  in  England ;  Scaliger  and  Lipsius,  then  Grotius 
arise  in  Holland,  Montaigne  and  Casaubon  in  France  ; 
the  destinies  of  the  world  are  in  the  hands  of  Henry 
IV.,  Queen  Elizabeth,  the  Prince  of  Orange ;  and,  as 
time  goes  on,  we  grow  more  and  more  accustomed  to 
expect  everything  great  in  this  quarter,  and  to  regard 
Italy  and  the  Mediterranean  as  out  of  date.  So  much 
was  natural.  The  contact  of  the  New  World  might 
have  been  expected  to  produce  this  effect,  for,  as  we 
have  always  been  accustomed  to  trace  ancient  civilisa- 
tion to  the  influence  of  the  Mediterranean,  we  are 
prepared  to  find  that  the  Atlantic,  when  once  it 
becomes  a  Mediterranean, — that  is,  when  once  lands 
are  laid  open  on  the  farther  side  of  it, — should  pro- 
duce similar  effects  on  a  grander  scale.  But  it  does 
not  at  once  appear  why  any  further  effects  should  be 
produced.  To  understand  this  we  must  consider  the 
peculiar  nature  of  the  contact  between  the  New 
World  and  the  Old,  and,  now  that  we  have  looked  a 
little  into  modern  colonisation,  we  are  in  a  condition 
to  do  so. 

Let  us  think  how  the  New  World  might  have 
acted  on  the  Old  quite  otherwise  than  as  it  did. 
What  if  America  had  been  found  to  be  full  of  power- 
ful and  consolidated  States  like  those  of  Europe? 


118  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lbct. 

Then  our  relations  with  it  would  have  been  similar  to 
our  present  relations  with  China  or  Japan.  Our 
advances  might  have  been  met  with  a  certain  prudery, 
as  by  China;  in  that  case  the  result  would  either 
have  been  non-intercourse,  or  some  attempt,  success- 
ful or  otherwise,  to  force  intercourse  upon  them.  Or 
the  American  States  might  have  proved  open-minded 
and  liberal  like  the  Japanese ;  then  there  might  have 
followed  intercourse,  exchange  of  ideas,  and  mutual 
benefit.  But  in  either  case  it  does  not  appear  that 
important  political  consequences  would  have  followed, 
for  in  those  days,  while  communication  was  so  difficult, 
it  is  not  likely  that  any  fusion  of  the  European 
political  system  with  the  American  system,  any 
alliances  of  European  with  American  States,  would 
have  taken  place.  The  two  worlds  would  have 
remained  aware  of  each  other,  yet  almost  closed  to 
each  other,  in  a  relation  less  like  that  we  now  see 
between  England  and  China  or  Japan  than  that  of 
England  with  the  same  countries  or  with  India  and 
Persia  during  the  seventeenth  century. 

Well !  there  were  no  such  consolidated  States  in 
America  except  in  Mexico  and  Peru,  where  they  were 
overwhelmed  in  a  moment  by  the  Spanish  advent- 
urers. Hence  the  New  "World  had  not  the  power  it 
would  otherwise  have  had  of  keeping  the  Old  at 
arm's  length.  And  the  consequence  was  that  there 
began  between  the  Old  World  and  the  New  an 
emigration. 

Now  this  by  itself  is  a  great  fact.  It  implies  that 
the  Atlantic  had  become,  not  merely  a  Mediterranean, 


TI  COMMERCE  AND  WAR  119 

but  something  more.  To  the  Greeks  the  Mediter- 
ranean gave  trade,  intercourse  with  foreigners, 
movement  and  change  of  ideas,  but  it  did  not,  unless 
perhaps  at  a  certain  time,  aflford  a  means  of  unbounded 
emigration.  Emigration  there  was,  but  on  a  scale 
not  only  inferior,  but  inferior  in  proportion.  Political 
Powers,  some  of  them  exclusive,  guarded  the  opposite 
shore.  But  even  this  fact  is  rather  social  than 
political.  Emigration  is  in  itself  only  a  private 
aflfair;  it  does  not,  as  such,  concern  Governments, 
and  though  it  may  produce  a  great  effect  upon  them, 
as  for  example  the  Puritan  emigration  to  New 
England  produced  no  doubt  a  perceptible  effect  in 
our  civil  troubles,  yet  this  effect  is  only  indirect. 

Governments  might  have  shut  their  eyes  to  all 
the  affairs  of  the  New  World.  In  that  case  the  great 
adventurers  would  perhaps  have  set  up  kingdoms  for 
themselves,  and  the  reaction  of  the  New  World  upon 
the  Old  would  have  been  confined  within  narrow  limits. 
The  Continent  of  America  was  so  roomy,  so  thinly 
peopled,  that  the  action  of  such  adventurers,  what- 
ever it  might  have  been,  would  have  had  no  remote 
consequences,  and  the  Governments  of  Europe  might 
have  looked  on  without  anxiety.  The  New  World 
would  then  have  exerted  as  little  influence  upon  the 
Old  as,  for  example,  the  South  American  States  now 
exert  upon  Europe.  Eevolutionary  violence  may 
rage  there,  but  it  rages  unheeded,  and  its  effects 
evaporate  in  the  boundless  toi  ritory  peopled  by  so  few 
inhabitants. 

By  considering  thus  what  might  have  been  we  are 


120  EXPANSION  Of  ENGLAND  lect. 

brought  to  discern  the  critical  point  in  the  course 
which  was  actually  pursued.  The  New  World  could 
not  but  exert  a  strong  influence,  but  it  need  not  have 
exerted,  directly  at  least,  any  properly  political 
influence  upon  the  Old.  It  was  made  into  a  political 
force  of  the  most  tremendous  magnitude  by  the 
interference  of  the  European  Governments,  by  their 
assuming  the  control  of  all  the  States  set  up  by  their 
subjects  in  it.  The  necessary  efi'ect  of  this  policy 
was  to  transform  entirely  the  politics  of  Europe,  by 
materially  altering  the  interest  and  position  of  five 
great  European  States.  I  bring  this  fact  into  strong 
relief  because  I  think  it  has  been  too  much  over- 
looked, and  it  is  the  fundamental  fact  upon  which 
this  course  of  lectures  is  founded.  In  one  word, 
the  New  World  in  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth 
centuries  does  not  lie  outside  Europe,  but  exists 
inside  it  as  a  principle  of  unlimited  political  change. 
Instead  of  being  an  isolated  region  in  which  history 
is  not  yet  interested,  it  is  a  present  influence  of  the 
utmost  importance  to  Avhich  the  historian  must  be 
continually  alive — an  influence  which  for  a  long  time 
rivalled  the  Reformation,  and  from  the  beginning  of 
the  eighteenth  century  surpassed  the  Reformation, 
in  its  eff"ect  upon  the  politics  of  the  European  States. 
Historians  of  those  centuries  have  kept  in  view 
mainly  two  or  perhaps  three  great  movements — 
first,  the  Reformation  and  its  consequences ;  secondly, 
the  constitutional  movement  in  each  country  leading 
to  liberty  in  England  and  to  revolution  through 
despotism  in  France.     They  have  also  considered  tlie 


VI  COMMERCE  AND  WAR  121 

great  Ascendencies  which  from  time  to  time  have 
arisen  in  Europe,  that  of  the  House  of  Austria,  that  of 
the  House  of  Bourbon,  and  again  that  of  Napoleon. 
>  These  great  movements  have  been,  as  it  were,  the 
framework  in  which  they  have  fitted  all  particular 
incidents.  The  framework  is  insuflficient  and  too 
exclusively  European.  It  furnishes  no  place  for  a 
multitude  of  most  important  occurrences,  and  the 
movement  which  it  overlooks  is  perhaps  greater  and 
certainly  more  continuous  and  durable  than  any  of 
those  which  it  recognises.  Each  view  of  Europe 
separately  is  true.  Europe  is  a  great  Church  and 
Empire  breaking  up  into  distinct  kingdoms  and 
national  or  voluntary  Churches,  as  those  say  who  fix 
their  eyes  on  the  Reformation ;  it  is  a  group  of 
monarchies  in  which  popular  freedom  has  been 
gradually  developing  itself,  as  the  constitutional 
lawyer  says ;  it  is  a  group  of  states  which  balance 
themselves  uneasily  against  each  other,  liable  there- 
fore to  be  thrown  ofi"  its  equilibrium  by  the  pre- 
ponderance of  one  of  them,  as  the  international 
lawyer  says.  But  all  these  accounts  are  incomplete 
and  leave  almost  half  the  facts  unexplained.  We 
must  add,  "  It  is  a  group  of  States,  of  which  the  five 
westernmost  have  been  acted  upon  by  a  steadfast 
gravitation  towards  the  New  World,  and  have 
dragged  in  their  train  great  New  World  Empires." 

I  have  already  applied  this  observation  to  the 
eighteenth  century,  and  shown  you  how  it  explains 
the  perpetual  struggles  which  that  century  witnessed 
between  England  and  France.     These  struggles,  I  am 


122  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

persuaded,  are  treated  by  historians  of  the  Balance  of 
Power  from  a  point  of  view  much  too  exclusively 
European,  This  strikes  me  particularly  in  the 
picture  they  give  of  the  career  of  Napoleon,  They 
see  in  him  simply  a  ruler  who  had  the  ambition  to 
undertake  the  conquest  of  all  Europe,  and  who  had 
the  genius  almost  to  succeed  in  this  enterprise. 
Now  the  main  peculiarity  of  his  career  is  that,  though 
he  did  this,  he  did  not  intend  it,  but  something 
different.  He  intended  to  make  great  conquests, 
and  he  made  great  conquests,  but  the  conquests  he 
made  were  not  those  he  intended  to  make.  Napoleon 
did  not  care  about  Europe.  "  Cette  vieille  Europe 
wHennuie,"  he  said  frankly.  His  ambition  was  all 
directed  towards  the  New  World.  He  is  the  Titan 
whose  dream  it  is  to  restore  that  Greater  France 
which  had  fallen  in  the  struggles  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  and  to  overthrow  that  Greater  Britain 
which  had  been  established  on  its  ruins.  He  makes 
no  secret  of  this  ambition,  nor  does  he  ever  renounce 
it.  His  conquests  in  Europe  are  made,  as  it  were, 
accidentally,  and  he  treats  them  always  as  a  starting- 
point  for  a  new  attack  on  England.  He  conquers 
Germany,  but  whyl  Because  Austria  and  Eussia, 
subsidised  by  England,  march  against  him  while  he 
is  brooding  at  Boulogne  over  the  conquest  of  England. 
When  Germany  is  conquered,  what  is  his  first 
thought?  That  now  he  has  a  ncAV  weapon  against 
England,  since  he  can  impose  the  Continental  System 
upon  all  Europe.  Does  he  occupy  Spain  and  Portu- 
gal %    It  is  because  they  are  maritime  countries  with 


VI  COMMERCE  AND  WAR  123 

fleets  and  colonies  that  may  be  used  against  England. 
Lastly,  when  you  study  such  an  enterprise  as  the 
Eussian  expedition,  you  are  forced  to  admit,  either 
that  it  had  no  object,  or  that  it  was  directed  against 
England.  But  this  view  escapes  most  historians, 
because  from  the  outset  they  have  underestimated 
the  magnitude  of  that  great  historical  cause,  the 
attraction  of  the  New  World  upon  the  Old,  To 
them  colonies  have  seemed  unimportant,  because  they 
were  distant  and  thinly  peopled,  as  it  were,  inert, 
almost  lifeless  appendages  to  the  parent-states.  And 
true  it  is  that  the  colonies  received  very  little  direct 
attention  in  the  headquarters  of  politics.  In  London 
or  Paris  no  doubt  few  people  troubled  themselves' 
with  the  affairs  of  Virginia  and  Louisiana ;  there  no 
doubt  domestic  topics  absorbed  attention,  and  politics 
seemed  centred  in  the  last  parliamentary  division  or 
the  last  court  intrigue.  But  the  eye  is  caught  by 
what  is  on  the  surface  of  things,  not  by  Avhat  is  at 
the  bottom  of  them;  and  the  hidden  cause  which 
made  Ministers  rise  and  fall,  which  convulsed  Europe 
and  led  it  into  war  and  revolution,  was,  far  more 
than  might  be  supposed,  the  standing  rivalry  of 
interests  in  the  New  World. 

But  if  this  is  so,  it  ought  to  be  applicable  to  the 
seventeenth  century  as  well  as  to  the  eighteenth.  In 
the  history  of  the  relation  of  the  New  World  to  the 
Old  the  three  centuries,  the  sixteenth,  seventeenth, 
and  eighteenth,  have  each  their  marked  character. 
The  sixteenth  century  may  be  called  the  Spain-and- 
Portugal  period.     As  yet  the  New  World  is  monopo- 


124  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

lised  by  the  two  nations  which  discovered  it,  by  the 
country  of  Vasco  da  Gama  and  the  adopted  country 
of  Columbus,  until  late  in-  the  century  Spain  and 
Portugal  become  one  State  in  the  hands  of  Philip  IL 
In  the  seventeenth  century  the  other  three  States, 
France,  Holland,  and  England,  enter  the  colonial 
field.  The  Dutch  take  the  lead.  In  the  course  of 
their  war  with  Spain  they  get  possession  of  most  of 
the  Portuguese  possessions,  which  have  now  become 
Spanish,  in  the  East  Indies ;  they  even  succeed  for  a 
time  in  annexing  Brazil.  France  and  England  soon 
after  establish  their  colonies  in  North  America. 
From  this  time  then,  or  almost  from  this  time,  we 
may  expect  to  trace  that  transformation  in  the 
politics  of  Europe,  which  I  showed  to  be  the  necessary 
consequence  of  the  new  position  assumed  by  these 
five  States.  During  the  course  of  this  century  a 
certain  change  takes  place  in  the  relative  colonial 
importance  of  the  five  States.  Portugal  declines  ;  so 
later  does  Holland.  Spain  remains  in  a  condition  of 
immobility ;  her  vast  possessions  are  not  lost,  but 
additions  are  no  longer  made  to  them,  and  they 
remain  secluded,  like  China  itself,  from  intercourse 
with  the  rest  of  the  world.  England  and  France 
have  both  decidedly  advanced  ;  Colbert  has  placed 
France  in  the  first  rank  of  commercial  countries,  and 
she  has  explored  the  Mississippi.  But  the  English 
colonies  have  decidedly  the  advantage  in  population. 
And  thus  it  is  that  the  eighteenth  century  witnesses 
the  great  duel  of  France  and  England  for  the  New 
World. 


VI  COMMERCE  AND  WAR  125 

I  exhibited  that  great  duel  early  in  this  course,  in 
order  to  show  you  at  once  by  a  conspicuous  instance 
that  the  expansion  of  England  has  been  neither  a 
tranquil  process  nor  yet  belonging  purely  to  the  most 
recent  times :  that  throughout  the  eighteenth  century 
that  expansion  was  an  active  principle  of  disturbance, 
a  cause  of  wars  unparalleled  both  in  magnitude  and 
number.  I  could  not  at  that  stage  go  further,  but 
now  that  we  have  analysed  the  attraction  of  the  New 
World  upon  the  Old  in  general  and  upon  England  in 
particular,  now  that  we  have  considered  the  nature 
and  intensity  of  that  attraction,  we  are  in  a  condition 
to  trace  further  back  and  even  to  its  beginning  the 
expansion  of  England  into  Greater  Britain. 

It  was  in  the  Elizabethan  age,  as  I  showed,  that 
England  first  assumed  its  modern  character,  and  this 
means,  as  I  showed  at  the  same  time,  that  then  first 
it  began  to  find  itself  in  the  main  current  of  commerce, 
and  then  first  to  direct  its  energies  to  the  sea  and  to 
the  New  World.  At  this  point  then  we  mark  the 
beginning  of  the  expansion,  the  first  sjrmptom  of 
the  rise  of  Greater  Britain.  The  great  event  which 
announces  to  the  world  England's  new  character  and 
the  new  place  which  she  is  assuming  in  the  world,  is 
the  naval  invasion  by  the  Spanish  Armada.  Here, 
we  may  say  decidedly,  begins  the  modern  history  of 
England.  Compare  this  event  with  anything  that 
preceded  it  in  English  history ;  you  will  see  at  once 
how  new  it  is.  And  if  you  inquire  in  what  precisely 
the  novelty  consists,  you  Avill  arrive  at  this  answer, 
that  the  event  is  throughout  oceanic.      Of  course  we 


126  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

had  always  been  an  island;  of  course  our  foreign 
wars  had  always  begun  at  least  on  the  sea.  But  by 
the  sea  in  earlier  times  had  always  been  meant  the 
strait,  the  channel,  or  at  most  the  narrow  seas.  Now 
for  the  first  time  it  is  different.  The  whole  struggle 
begins,  proceeds  and  ends  upon  the  sea,  and  it  is  but 
the  last  act  of  a  drama  which  has  been  played,  not 
in  the  English  seas  at  all,  but  in  the  Atlantic,  the 
Pacific,  and  the  Gulf  of  Mexico.  The  invader  is  the 
master  of  the  New  World,  the  inheritor  of  the 
legacies  of  Columbus  and  Vasco  da  Gama ;  his  main 
complaint  is  that  his  monopoly  of  that  New  World 
has  been  infringed;  and  by  whom  is  the  invasion 
met  1  Not  by  the  Hotspurs  of  medieval  chivalry,  nor 
by  the  archers  who  won  Cr^cy  for  us,  but  by  a  new 
race  of  men,  such  as  medieval  England  had  not 
known,  by  the  hero  -  buccaneers,  the  Drakes  and 
Hawkinses,  whose  lives  had  been  passed  in  tossing 
upon  that  Ocean  which  to  their  fathers  had  been  an 
unexplored,  unprofitable  desert.  Now  for  the  first 
time  might  it  be  said  of  England — what  the  popular 
song  assumes  to  have  been  always  true  of  her — that 
"  her  march  is  on  the  Ocean  wave." 

But  there  is  no  Greater  Britain  as  yet ;  only  the 
impulse  has  been  felt  to  found  one,  and  the  path  has 
been  explored,  which  leads  to  the  transatlantic  seats 
where  the  Englishmen  of  Greater  Britain  may  one 
day  live.  While  Drake  and  Hawkins  have  set  the 
example  of  the  rough  heroism  and  love  of  roaming 
which  might  find  the  vray  into  the  Promised  Land, 
Humphrey  Gilbert  and  Walter  Raleigh  display  the 


VI  COMMERCE  AND  WAR  127 

genius  which  settles,  founds  and  colonises.  In  the 
next  reign  Greater  Britain  is  founded,  though  neither 
Gilbert  nor  Raleigh  are  allowed  to  enter  into  it.  In 
1606  James  I.  signs  the  Charter  of  Virginia,  and  in 
1620  that  of  New  England.  And  now  very  speedily 
the  new  life  with  which  England  is  animated,  her 
new  objects  and  her  new  resources,  are  exhibited  so 
as  to  attract  the  attention  of  all  Europe.  It  is  in  the 
war  of  King  and  Parliament,  and  afterwards  in  the 
Protectorate,  that  the  new  English  policy  is  first  ex- 
hibited on  a  great  scale.  Under  Cromwell  England 
appears,  but  prematurely  and  on  the  unsound  basis 
of  imperialism,  such  as  she  definitely  became  under 
William  III.  and  continued  to  be  throughout  the 
eighteenth  century,  and  this  is  England  steadily  ex- 
panding into  Greater  Britain. 

It  seems  to  me  to  be  the  principal  characteristic 
of  this  phase  of  England  that  she  is  at  once  commer- 
cial and  warlike.  A  commonplace  is  current  about 
the  natural  connection  between  commerce  and  peace, 
and  hence  it  has  been  inferred  that  the  wars  of 
modern  England  are  attributable  to  the  influence  of 
a  feudal  aristocracy.  Aristocracies,  it  is  said,  naturally 
love  war,  being  in  their  own  origin  military  ;  whereas 
the  trader  just  as  naturally  desires  peace,  that  he 
may  practise  his  trade  without  interruption.  A  good 
specimen  of  the  a  priori  method  of  reasoning  in 
politics !  Why !  how  came  we  to  conquer  India  1 
Was  it  not  a  direct  consequence  of  trading  with  India  ? 
And  that  is  only  the  most  conspicuous  illustration  of  a 
law  which  prevails  throughout  English  history  in  the 


128  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries, — thelaw,  namely, 
of  the  intimate  interdependence  of  war  and  trade,  so 
that  throughout  that  period  trade  leads  naturally  to 
war  and  war  fosters  trade.  I  have  pointed  out 
already  that  the  wars  of  the  eighteenth  century  were 
incomparably  greater  and  more  burdensome  than 
those  of  the  Middle  Ages.  In  a  less  degree  those  of 
the  seventeenth  century  were  also  great.  These  are 
precisely  the  centuries  in  which  England  grew  more 
and  more  a  commercial  country.  England  indeed 
grew  ever  more  warlike  at  that  time  as  she  grew  more 
commercial.  And  it  is  not  difficult  to  show  that  a 
cause  was  at  work  to  make  war  and  commerce  increase 
together.     This  cause  is  the  old  colonial  system. 

Commerce  in  itself  may  favour  peace,  but  when 
commerce  is  artificially  shut  out  by  a  decree  of 
Government  from  some  promising  territory,  then 
commerce  just  as  naturally  favours  war.  We  know 
this  by  our  own  recent  experience  with  China.  The 
New  World  might  have  favoured  trade  without  at 
the  same  time  favouring  war,  if  it  had  consisted  of  a 
number  of  liberal-minded  States  open  to  intercourse 
with  foreigners,  or  if  it  had  been  occupied  by  Euro- 
pean colonies  which  pursued  an  equally  liberal 
system.  But  we  now  know  what  the  old  colonial 
system  was.  We  know  that  it  carved  out  the  New 
World  into  territories,  which  were  regarded  as  estates, 
to  be  enjoyed  in  each  case  by  the  colonising  nation. 
The  hope  of  obtaining  such  splendid  estates  and 
enjoying  the  profits  that  Avere  reaped  from  them,  con- 
stituted the  greatest  stimulus  to  commerce  that  had 


n  COMMERCE  AND  WAR  129 

ever  been  known,  and  it  was  a  stimulus  which  acted 
without  intermission  for  centuries.  This  vast  historic 
cause  had  gradually  the  effect  of  bringing  to  an  end 
the  old  medieval  structure  of  society  and  introducing 
the  industrial  ages.  But  inseparable  from  the  com- 
mercial stimulus  was  the  stimulus  of  international 
rivalry.  The  object  of  each  nation  was  now  to 
increase  its  trade,  not  by  waiting  upon  the  wants  of 
mankind,  but  by  a  wholly  different  method,  namely 
by  getting  exclusive  possession  of  some  rich  tract  in 
the  New  World.  Now  whatever  may  be  the  natural 
opposition  between  the  spirit  of  trade  and  the  spirit 
of  war,  trade  pursued  in  this  method  is  almost 
identical  with  war,  and  can  hardly  fail  to  lead  to  war. 
What  is  conquest  but  appropriation  of  territory? 
Now  appropriation  of  territory  under  the  old  colonial 
system  became  the  first  national  object.  The  five 
nations  of  the  West  were  launched  into  an  eager  com- 
petition for  territory — that  is,  they  were  put  into  a 
relation  to  each  other  in  which  the  pursuit  of  wealth 
naturally  led  to  quarrels,  a  relation  in  which,  as  I 
said,  commerce  and  war  were  inseparably  entangled 
together,  so  that  commerce  led  to  war  and  war 
fostered  commerce.  The  character  of  the  new  period 
which  was  thus  opened  showed  itself  very  early. 
Consider  the  nature  of  that  long  desultory  war  of 
England  with  Spain,  of  which  the  expedition  of  the 
Armada  was  the  most  striking  incident.  I  have  said 
that  the  English  sea-captains  were  very  like  buc- 
caneers, and  indeed  to  England  the  war  is  throughout 
an  industry,  a  way  to  wealth,  the  most  thriving 
K 


130  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

business,  the  most  profitable  investment,  of  the  time. 
That  Spanish  war  is  in  fact  the  infancy  of  English 
foreign  trade.  The  first  generation  of  Englishmen 
that  invested  capital,  put  it  into  that  war.  As  now 
we  put  our  money  into  railways  or  what  notl  so 
then  the  keen  man  of  business  took  shares  in  the 
new  ship  which  John  Oxenham  or  Francis  Drake  was 
fitting  out  at  Plymouth,  and  which  was  intended  to 
lie  in  wait  for  the  treasure  galleons,  or  make  raids 
upon  the  Spanish  towns  in  the  Gulf  of  Mexico.  And 
yet  the  two  countries  were  formally  not  even  at  war 
with  each  other.  It  was  thus  that  the  system  of 
monopoly  in  the  New  World  made  trade  and  war 
indistinguishable  from  each  other.  The  prosperity 
of  Holland  was  the  next  and  a  still  more  startling 
illustration  of  the  same  law.  What  more  ruinous, 
you  say,  than  a  long  war,  especially  to  a  small  state  1 
And  yet  Holland  made  her  fortune  in  the  world  by 
a  war  of  some  eighty  years  with  Spain.  How  was 
this  1  It  was  because  war  threw  open  to  her  attack 
the  whole  boundless  possessions  of  her  antagonist  in 
the  New  World,  which  would  have  been  closed  to  her 
in  peace.  By  conquest  she  made  for  herself  an 
Empire,  and  this  Empire  made  her  rich. 

These  are  the  new  views  which  begin  to  determine 
English  policy  under  the  Protectorate.  From  the 
point  from  which  we  here  regard  English  history,  the 
great  occurrence  of  the  seventeenth  century  before 
1688  is  not  the  Civil  War  or  the  execution  of  the 
King,  but  the  intervention  of  Cromwell  in  the  Euro- 
pean war.     This  act  may  almost  be  regarded  as  the 


VI  COMMEECE  AND  WAR  131 

foundation  of  the  English  World-Empire.  It  was  of  so 
much  immediate  importance  that  it  may  be  said  to 
have  decided  the  fall  of  the  Spanish  Power.  Spain, 
which  less  than  a  century  before  had  overshadowed 
the  world,  is  found  soon  after  lying  a  helpless  prey 
to  the  ambition  of  Louis  XIV.  Perhaps  the  turning- 
point  is  marked  by  the  Eevolution  of  Portugal, 
which  took  place  in  1640.  Then  began  the  fall  of 
Spain.  But  for  twenty  years  from  that  time  she 
struggled  with  her  destiny,  and  the  internal  troubles 
of  her  rival  France  caused  a  reaction  in  her  favour. 
At  this  crisis  then  the  interference  of  Cromwell  was 
decisive.  Spain  fell  never  to  rise  again,  and  no 
measure  taken  by  England  had  for  centuries  been  so 
momentous. 

But  it  marks  the  rise  as  well  as  the  fall  of  a  World- 
Power.  England  by  this  time  has  learned  to  profit 
by  the  example  of  Holland,  and  follows  her  in  the 
path  of  commercial  empire.  The  first  Stuarts,  though 
it  was  in  their  time  that  our  first  colonies  were 
founded,  show,  I  think,  no  signs  of  having  entered 
into  the  new  ideas.  They  abandon  the  Elizabethan 
system,  and  set  their  faces  towards  the  Old  World 
rather  than  the  New.  But  this  reaction  comes  to  an 
end  with  the  accession  to  power  of  the  party  of  the 
Commonwealth.  A  policy  now  begins  which  is  not, 
to  be  sure,  very  scrupulous,  but  is  able,  resolute,  and 
successful. 

It  is  oceanic  and  looks  westward,  like  the  policy 
of  the  later  years  of  Elizabeth.  Here  for  the  first 
time  the  New  World  reacts  upon  the  Old  by  actual 


132  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LEOT. 

personal  influence.  Dr.  Palfrey  lias  traced  in  a  very 
interesting  manner  what  I  may  call  the  New  England 
clement  in  our  Parliamentary  party.  New  England 
was  itself  the  child  of  Puritanism,  and  of  Puritanism 
in  that  second  form  of  Independency  to  which  Crom- 
well himself  adhered.  Accordingly  it  took  a  very 
direct  part  in  the  English  Revolution.  Several  pro- 
minent English  politicians  of  that  time  may  be 
mentioned  who  had  themselves  lived  in  Massa- 
chusetts, e.g.  Sir  Henry  Vane,  George  Downing,  and 
Hugh  Peters,  Cromwell's  chaplain.  Now  too  the 
great  English  navy,  so  famous  since,  begins  to  rule 
the  seas  under  the  command  of  Robert  Blake.  The 
navy  is  now  and  henceforth  the  great  instrument  of 
England's  power.  The  army — though  it  is  more  highly 
organised  than  ever  before,  and  has  in  fact  usurped 
the  government  of  the  country  and  placed  its  leader 
on  the  throne, — this  army  falls  with  a  great  catas- 
trophe and  is  devoted  to  public  execration,  but  the 
navy  from  this  time  forward  is  the  nation's  favourite. 
Henceforward  it  is  a  maxim  that  England  is  not  a 
military  state,  that  she  ought  to  have  either  no  army 
or  the  smallest  army  possible,  but  that  her  navy 
ought  to  be  the  strongest  in  the  world. 

From  our  point  of  view  the  colonial  policy  of 
Cromwell  does  not  attract  us  by  any  marked  super- 
iority either  in  morality  or  success  to  that  of  the 
Restoration,  but  rather  as  the  model  which  Charles 
n.  imitates.  Moral  rectitude  is  hardly  a  character- 
istic of  it,  and  if  it  is  religious,  this  perhaps  would 
have  appeared,  had  the  Protectorate  lasted  longer,  to 


VI  COMMERCE  AND  WAR  133 

have  been  its  most  dangerous  feature.  Nothing  is 
more  dangerous  than  Imperialism  marching  with  an 
idea  on  its  banner,  and  Protestantism  was  to  our 
Emperor  Oliver  what  the  ideas  of  the  Eevolution 
were  to  Napoleon  and  his  nephew.  The  success  too 
of  this  policy  is  of  the  same  Napoleonic  type.  Eng- 
land had  become  for  the  moment  a  military  State, 
and  necessarily  assumed  a  far  grander  position  in  the 
world  than  she  could  support  when  she  disbanded 
her  army  and  became  constitutional  again.  The 
Protectorate  was  fortunate  in  coming  to  an  end 
before  its  true  character  was  understood.  By  the 
law  of  its  nature  it  was  drawn  towards  war.  It  is 
an  illusion  to  suppose  that  the  Puritanism  of  the 
Protector  or  of  his  party  was  analogous  to  modern 
Liberalism,  and  therefore  inspired  a  repugnance  to 
war.  Eead  Marvell's  panegyric  on  him.  The  virtu- 
ous poet  predicts  that  Oliver  will  be  ere  long  "a 
Csesar  to  Gaul  and  a  Hannibal  to  Italy."  Does  the 
prospect  shock  him  ?  Not  at  all ;  lest  his  hero  should 
falter  in  the  course,  he  exhorts  him  to  "  march  inde- 
fatigably  on,"  and  bids  him  remember  that  "  the  same 
acts  that  did  gain  a  power  must  it  maintain."  Nor 
when  we  examine  the  Protector's  foreign  policy  do 
we  find  him  unmindful  of  this  principle.  He  seems 
to  look  forward  to  a  religious  war,  in  which  England 
will  play  the  same  part  in  Europe  that  he  himself 
with  his  Ironsides  has  played  in  England.  Some  of 
his  modern  admirers  have  perceived  this.  "In  truth," 
writes  Macaulay,  "  there  was  nothing  which  Cromwell 
had,  for  his  own  sake  and  that  of  his  family,  so  much 


134  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

reason  to  desire  as  a  general  religious  war  in  Europe. 
.  .  .  UnlmppiUj  for  him  he  had  no  opportunity  of  dis- 
playing his  admirable  military  talents  except  against 
the  inhabitants  of  the  British  isles."  We  may  well, 
I  think,  shudder  at  the  thought  of  the  danger  which 
was  removed  by  the  fall  of  the  Protectorate. 

On  the  side  of  the  Continent  this  imperialist  policy 
was  developed  but  imperfectly,  but  on  the  side  of  the 
New  World,  where  it  was  borne  upon  the  tide  of  the 
time,  it  went  further  and  had  more  lasting  conse- 
quences. Here  indeed  Cromwell's  policy  is  only  that 
of  the  Long  Parliament  before  him  and  of  Charles  II. 
after  him.  It  has  indeed  a  peculiarly  absolute  and 
unscrupulous  tinge.  Of  his  own  pure  will,  without 
consulting  directly  or  indirectly  the  people,  and  in 
spite  of  opposition  in  his  Council,  he  plunges  the 
country  into  a  war  with  Spain.  This  war  is  com- 
menced after  the  manner  of  the  old  Elizabethan 
sea-rovers  by  a  sudden  descent  without  previous 
quarrel  or  declaration  of  war  upon  St.  Domingo.  I 
remember  hearing  a  predecessor  of  my  own.  Sir  J. 
Stephen,  say  in  this  place  that,  if  any  of  his  hearers 
had  a  taste  for  iconoclasm,  he  could  recommend  him 
to  employ  it  upon  the  buccaneering  Cromwell.  Per- 
haps this  may  seem  too  severe,  when  we  remember 
the  lawlessness  of  all  maritime  war  at  that  time. 
What  I  wish  you  to  remark  is  the  continuity  that 
holds  together  this  Cromwellian  policy  with  the 
Elizabethan,  and  equally  with  the  policy  which 
the  nation  pursued  in  the  eighteenth  century,  when 
in  1739  it  went  to  war  again  to  break  the  Spanish 


VI  COMMERCE  AND  WAR  135 

monopoly.  In  all  these  cases  alike  you  see  the  close 
connection  which  the  old  colonial  system  established 
between  war  and  trade. 

But  the  great  characteristic  of  this  Commonwealth 
period,  indeed  of  the  whole  middle  part  of  the  seven- 
teenth century,  is  not  war  with  Spain,  but  war  with 
Holland.  If  Cromwell's  breach  with  Spain  shows 
most  strikingly  by  its  violent  suddenness  the  spirit 
of  the  new  commercial  policy,  yet  it  is  capable  of 
being  misinterpreted.  For  Spain  was  the  great 
Catholic  Power,  and  therefore  it  miglit  be  imagined 
that  our  war  with  her  was  caused  by  the  other  great 
historic  cause  which  then  acted,  by  the  Eeformation, 
and  not  by  the  New  World.  But  what  of  our  war 
with  Holland  ?  Had  the  Reformation  been  the 
dominating  cause  in  the  seventeenth  century,  we 
should  have  seen  England  and  Holland  in  permanent 
brotherly  alliance.  It  is  the  great  proof  that  this 
cause  is  fast  giving  way  to  the  other,  viz.  the  great 
trade-rivalry  produced  by  the  New  World,  that  all 
through  the  middle  of  the  seventeenth  century 
England  and  Holland  wage  great  naval  wars  of  a 
character  such  as  had  never  been  seen  before.  These 
wars  are  seldom  sufficiently  considered  as  a  Avhole, 
and  therefore  are  explained  by  causes  which  in  fact 
were  only  secondary.  This  is  especially  the  case 
with  the  war  of  1672,  for  which  Charles  II.  and  the 
Cabal  are  responsible.  It  is  cited  as  a  proof  of  the 
reckless  immorality  of  that  Government,  that  it 
combined  with  the  Catholic  Government  of  Louis 
XIV.  to  strike  a  deadly  blow  at  the  brother  Pro- 


136  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect, 

testant  Power,  and  that  it  did  so  for  a  dynastic 
interest,  for  the  purpose  of  overthrowing  the  oli- 
garchic or  Louvestein  faction  and  raising  to  power 
Charles  II. 's  nephew,  the  young  Prince  of  Orange. 
And  no  doubt  Charles  II.  had  this  object.  Never- 
theless there  was  nothing  new  at  that  time  either  in 
war  with  Holland  or  alliance  with  France.  Instead 
of  suddenly  reversing  the  foreign  policy  of  the 
country,  Charles  here  followed  precedents  set  by 
the  Commonwealth  and  by  Cromwell,  for  the  former 
had  waged  fierce  war  with  Holland,  and  the  latter 
had  entered  into  alliance  with  France.  Accordingly 
the  Government  was  supported  by  some  of  those 
who  inherited  the  tradition  of  the  Commonwealth. 
Anthony  Ashley  Cooper,  a  man  of  Cromwellian  ideas, 
supported  it  by  quoting  the  old  words  Delenda  est 
Carthago.  In  other  words:  "Holland  is  our  great 
rival  in  trade,  on  the  Ocean  and  in  the  New  World. 
Let  us  destroy  her,  though  she  be  a  Protestant  Power ; 
let  us  destroy  her  with  the  help  of  a  Catholic  Power." 
These  were  the  maxims  of  the  Commonwealth  and  of 
the  Protector,  because,  Puritans  though  they  were, 
and  though  they  had  risen  up  against  Popery,  they 
understood  that  in  their  age  the  struggle  of  the 
Churches  was  falling  into  the  background,  and  that 
the  rivalry  of  the  maritime  Powers  for  trade  and 
empire  in  the  New  World  was  taking  its  place  as  the 
question  of  the  day. 

And  thus  we  are  able  to  fill  up  the  large  outline 
of  the  history  of  Greater  Britain.  We  saw  in  the 
Elizabethan   war   with    Spain    the    movement,    the 


VI  COMMEKCE  AND  WAR  137 

fermentation  out  of  which  it  sprang.  Under  the 
first  two  Stuarts  we  see  it  actually  come  into  exist- 
ence by  the  settlement  of  Virginia,  New  England 
and  Maryland.  At  a  later  time,  in  the  eighteenth 
century,  it  is  seen  to  engage,  now  more  mature,  in  a 
long  duel  with  Greater  France.  What  occupies  the 
interval  1  This  is  the  foimdation  of  the  English 
na,vj  and  the  great  duel  with  Holland.  It  covers 
the  middle  of  the  seventeenth  century,  it  embraces  our 
first  great  naval  wars,  and  the  following  acquisitions  : 
— Jamaica  conquered  under  Cromwell  from  Spain, 
Bombay  received  by  Charles  II.  from  Portugal,  New 
York  acquired  also  by  Charles  II.  from  Holland. 

This  great  struggle  with  Holland  is  followed  by  a 
period  of  close  alliance  with  Holland,  represented  in 
the  career  of  ^Yilliam  of  Orange.  From  our  point 
of  view  this  appears  as  a  temporary  revival  of  the 
Reformation-contest.  By  the  Revocation  of  the  Edict 
of  Nantes  the  world  is  thrown  back  into  the  religious 
wars  of  the  sixteenth  century.  The  New  World 
passes  for  a  time  into  the  background ;  once  more 
the  question  is  of  Catholicism  or  religious  freedom. 
Once  more  therefore  the  two  Protestant  Powers 
stand  shoulder  to  shoulder  against  France.  William 
rules  both  countries  and  the  trade-rivalry  is  adjourned 
for  a  time. 


LECTUEE  VII 


PHASES   OF  EXPANSION 


The  object  I  professed  to  set  before  myself  in  these 
lectures  was  to  present  English  history  to  you  in 
such  a  light  that  the  interest  of  it  instead  of  gradually 
diminishing  should  go  on  increasing  to  the  close. 
You  will  perceive  by  this  time  in  what  way  I  hope 
to  do  this.  It  is  impossible  that  the  history  of  any 
State  can  be  interesting,  unless  it  exhibits  some  sort 
of  development.  Political  life  that  is  uniform  has 
no  history,  however  prosperous  it  may  be.  Now  it 
appears  to  me  that  English  historians  fail  in  the 
later  periods  of  England,  because  they  have  traced 
one  great  development  to  its  completion,  and  do  not 
perceive  that,  if  they  would  advance  further,  they 
must  look  out  for  some  other  development.  More 
or  less  consciously,  they  have  always  before  their 
minds  the  idea  of  constitutional  liberty.  This  idea 
suffices  until  they  reach  the  licvolution  of  1688, 
perhaps  even  until  they  reach  the  accession  of  the 


LECT.  VII  PHASES  OF  EXPANSION  139 

House  of  Brunswick.  But  after  this  it  fails  them. 
Not  that  development  ceases  in  the  English  Con- 
stitution at  that  point,  nor  even  that  to  the  political 
student  it  becomes  less  interesting.  But  it  begins  to 
be  gradual  and  quiet ;  the  tension  is  relaxed ;  dram- 
atic incident  henceforth  must  be  looked  for  elsewhere. 
Our  historians  are  not  sufficiently  alive  to  this.  It 
may  be  true  that  George  III.'s  use  of  royal  influence 
attained  in  an  insidious  way  objects  similar  to  those 
which  the  Stuarts  tried  to  reach  by  prerogative  or 
by  military  force.  But  when  Wilkes  and  Home 
Tooke,  Chatham  and  Fox  are  brought  forward  to 
play  the  parts  of  Prynne  and  Milton,  Pym  and 
Shaftesbury,  the  interest  of  the  reader  grows  languid. 
He  seems  to  have  before  him  the  feeble  second  part 
of  some  striking  story.  Those  parliamentary  strug- 
gles which  in  the  seventeenth  century  were  so  intense, 
seem,  when  repeated  in  the  eighteenth,  to  have 
something  conventional  about  them. 

The  mistake,  according  to  me,  lies  in  selecting 
these  struggles  to  fill  the  foreground  of  the  scene. 
It  is  a  misrepresentation  to  describe  England  in 
George  III.'s  reign  as  mainly  occupied  in  resisting 
the  encroachments  of  a  somewhat  narrow-minded 
king.  "We  exaggerate  the  importance  of  these  petty 
struggles.  England  was  then  engaged  in  other  and 
vaster  enterprises.  She  was  not  wholly  occupied  in 
doing  over  again  what  she  had  done  before ;  she  was 
also  doing  new  and  great  things.  And  these  new 
things  had  vast  consequences,  which  have  changed 
and  are  at  this  day  changing  the  face  of  the  world. 


140  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  ^  lbot. 

It  is   the  historian's  business  then  to  open  a  new 
scene,  and  to  bring  into  the  foreground  new  actors. 

I  have  now  brought  out  in  strong  relief  this  new 
development  in  English  history.  I  have  shown  that 
in  the  same  seventeenth  century,  when  England  at 
home  was  victoriously  reconciling  her  old  Teutonic 
liberties  to  modern  political  conditions,  and  finding  a 
place  in  England  for  the  professional  soldier  and  for 
the  religious  dissenter,  she  was  also  at  work  abroad. 
She,  along  with  the  other  four  western  States  of 
Europe,  was  founding  an  empire  in  the  New  World. 
I  have  shown  also  that,  though  she  began  this  work 
later  than  some  other  States,  and  did  not  for  a  long 
time  make  strikingly  rapid  progress  in  it,  yet  in  the 
end  she  left  all  her  rivals  behind,  so  that  she  alone 
now  remains  in  possession  of  a  great  New  World 
empire.  Now  it  was  in  the  eighteenth  century,  just 
when  the  struggle  for  liberty  was  over,  that  she 
began  thus  to  take  the  lead  in  the  New  World,  and 
it  is  now,  in  the  nineteenth  century,  that  she  finds 
herself  called  upon  to  consider  what  new  shape  she 
shall  give  to  the  Empire  she  possesses.  It  plainly 
follows  that  here  is  the  new  development  we  are  in 
search  of — the  development  which  ought  to  make 
the  principal  study  of  historians  from  the  time  when 
they  find  constitutional  liberty  a  completed  develop- 
ment, and  therefore  an  exhausted  topic.  For  here  is 
a  development  which  ever  since  the  seventeenth 
century  has  been  steadily  growing  in  magnitude; 
here  is  a  development  which  binds  together  the 
future  with  the  past. 


VII  PHASES  OF  EXPANSION  141 

If  then  we  give  it  the  principal  place,  we  escape 
the  perplexity  into  which  most  historians  fall,  who 
strangely  find  the  history  grow  less  and  less  interest- 
ing as  England  grows  greater  and  greater.  But  at 
the  same  time  we  shall  find  much  rearrangement 
necessary.  For  we  shall  have  adopted  a  new 
standard  of  importance  for  events,  and  a  new 
principle  of  grouping.  Colonial  affairs  and  Indian 
affairs  are  usually  pushed  a  little  on  one  side  by 
historians.  They  are  relegated  to  supplementary 
chapters.  It  spems  to  be  assumed  that  affairs  which 
are  remote  from  England  cannot  deserve  a  leading 
place  in  a  history  of  England,  as  if  the  England  of 
which  histories  are  written  were  the  island  so-called, 
and  not  the  political  union  named  after  the  island, 
which  is  quite  capable  of  expanding  so  as  to  cover 
half  the  globe.  To  us  England  will  be  wherever 
English  people  are  found,  and  we  shall  look  for  its 
history  in  whatever  places  witness  the  occurrences 
most  important  to  Englishmen.  And  therefore,  as 
in  the  periods  when  the  liberties  of  England  were  in 
danger  we  seek  it  principally  at  Westminster  in  the 
Parliamentary  debates,  so  in  these  periods,  of  which 
the  characteristic  is  that  England  is  expanding  into 
Greater  Britain,  English  history  will  be  wherever 
this  expansion  is  taking  place,  even  when  the  scene 
is  as  remote  as  Canada  or  as  India.  We  shall  avoid 
the  error  commonly  committed  in  these  later  periods 
of  confounding  the  history  of  England  with  the 
history  of  Parliament.  The  rearrangement  which 
such  a  change  will  involve  may  affect  especially  the 


142  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

nineteenth  and  eighteenth  centuries.  But  in  the 
seventeenth  century  also,  though  wo  may  not  wish  to 
displace  the  accepted  arrangement,  which  has  refer- 
ence to  the  struggle  for  liberty  with  the  Stuart 
Kings,  yet  we  must  keep  in  our  minds  at  the  same 
time  another  arrangement,  founded  on  the  principle  of 
marking  the  stages  in  the  advance  of  Greater  Britain. 
The  accepted  arrangement  is  according  to  reigns 
and  dynasties,  and  in  each  reign  it  ranks  as  the 
principal  occurrences  the  dealings  of  the  sovereign 
with  Parliament.  On  this  system  the  leading 
demarcations  are  the  accession  of  the  House  of 
Brunswick,  and  beyond  that  the  accession  of  the 
House  of  Stuart,  and  in  the  middle  the  Great 
Interregnum  and  the  Revolution  of  1688.  We  make 
far  too  much  of  these  demarcations  even  when  they 
are  unobjectionable.  We  imagine  a  much  greater 
difference  than  really  existed  between  the  age  of 
George  I.  and  that  of  Queen  Anne,  between  that  of 
William  IH.  and  that  of  Charles  II.,  between  the 
Restoration  and  the  Commonwealth,  between  the  age 
of  James  I.  and  the  Elizabethan  age.  The  Revolu- 
tion was  not  nearly  so  revolutionary,  nor  the  Re- 
storation so  reactionary,  as  is  commonly  supposed. 
But  if  once  we  begin  to  think  of  England  as  a  living 
organism,  which  in  the  Elizabethan  age  began  a 
process  of  expansion,  never  intermitted  since,  into 
Greater  Britain,  we  shall  find  these  divisions  alto- 
gether useless,  and  shall  feel  the  want  of  a  completely 
new  set  of  divisions  to  mark  the  successive  stages  of 
the  expansion. 


vn  PHASES  OF  EXPANSION  143 

I  have  already  pointed  out  some  of  the  principal 
of  these  divisions.  But  it  will  be  well  to  present  a 
connected  view  of  English  history  as  it  appears  when 
arranged  on  this  principle. 

The  history  of  the  expansion  of  England  must  neces- 
sarily begin  with  the  two  ever-memorable  voyages  of 
Columbus  and  Vasco  da  Gama  in  the  reign  of  Henry 
VII.  From  that  moment  the  position  of  England 
among  countries  was  entirely  changed,  though  almost 
a  century  elapsed  before  the  change  became  visible  to 
all  the  world.  In  our  rearrangement  this  tract  of 
time  forms  one  period,  the  characteristic  of  which  is 
that  England  is  gradually  finding  out  her  vocation  to 
the  sea.  We  pass  by  the  domestic  disturbances, 
political,  religious  and  social,  of  that  crowded  age. 
We  see  nothing  of  the  Reformation  and  its  conse- 
quences. What  we  see  is  simply  that  England  is 
slowly  and  gradually  taking  courage  to  claim  her 
share  with  the  Spanish  and  Portuguese  in  the  new 
world  that  has  been  thrown  open.  There  are  a  few 
voyages  to  Newfoundland  and  Labrador,  then  there 
is  a  series  of  bold  adventures,  which,  however,  proved 
not  to  have  been  happily  planned.  Our  explorers, 
naturally  but  unfortunately,  turned  their  attention 
to  the  Polar  regions,  and  so  discovered  notliing  but 
frozen  Oceans,  while  their  rivals  were  making  a 
triumphal  progress  "  on  from  island  unto  island  at  the 
gateways  of  the  day."  Next  comes  the  scries  of 
buccaneering  raids  upon  the  Spanish  settlements,  in 
the  course  of  which  the  English  earned  at  least  a 
character  for  seamanship  and  audacity. 


144  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

The  Spanish  Armada  marks  the  moment  when 
this  period  of  preparation  or  apprenticeship  closes. 
The  internal  modification  in  the  nation  is  now  com- 
plete. It  has  turned  itself  round,  and  looks  now  no 
longer  towards  the  Continent  but  towards  the  Ocean 
and  the  New  World.  It  has  become  both  maritime 
and  industrial. 

On  the  other  system  of  arrangement  the  accession 
of  the  House  of  Stuart  is  thought  to  mark  a  decline. 
The  Tudor  sovereignty,  popular  and  exercised  with 
resolution  and  insight,  makes  way  for  a  monarchy  of 
divine  right,  pedantic  and  unintelligent.  Nevertheless 
in  our  view  there  is  no  decline ;  there  is  continuous 
development.  The  personal  unlikeness  of  James  and 
Charles  to  Elizabeth  is  a  matter  of  indifference.  The 
foundation  of  Greater  Britain  now  takes  place.  John 
Smith,  the  Pilgrim  Fathers,  and  Calvert  establish  the 
colonies  of  Virginia,  New  England,  and  Maryland,  of 
which  the  last  marks  its  date  by  its  name,  taken  from 
Queen  Henrietta  Maria. 

Greater  -Britain  henceforth  exists,  for  henceforth 
Englishmen  are  living  on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic 
Ocean.  It  received  at  once  a  peculiar  stamp  from 
the  circumstances  of  the  time.  Greater  Spain  had 
been  an  artificial  fabric,  to  which  much  thought  and 
skilful  contrivance  had  been  applied  by  the  Home 
Government.  Authority,  both  civil  and  ecclesiastical, 
was  more  rigorous  there  than  at  home.  This  was 
because  the  Spanish  settlements,  as  producing  a 
steady  revenue,  were  all-important  to  the  mother- 
country.     The   English  settlements,  not  being  thus 


vn  PHASES  OF  EXPANSION  145 

important,  were  neglected.  This  neglect  had  a 
momentous  result  owing  to  the  discord  just  then 
springing  up  in  England.  Colonies,  if  not  sources  of 
wealth,  might  at  least  be  useful  as  places  of  refuge 
for  unauthorised  opinions.  Half  a  century  before  the 
voyage  of  the  Mayflower  Coligny  ^  had  given  this 
turn  to  colonisation.  He  had  conceived  that  idea  of 
toleration  along  with  local  separation  of  rival  religions, 
which  was  afterwards  realised  within  France  itself  by 
the  Edict  of  Nantes.  How  different,  be  it  said  in 
passing,  would  the  world  now  be,  if  a  Huguenot 
France  had  sprung  up  beyond  the  Atlantic !  The 
idea  of  Coligny  was  now  realised  by  England."  As 
her  settlements  were  made  at  a  critical  moment  of 
dissension,  an  impulse  to  emigration  was  supplied 
which  would  not  otherwise  have  existed,  but  at  the 
same  time  there  was  introduced  a  subtle  principle 
of  opposition  between  the  New  World  and  the  Old. 
The  emigrants  departed  with  a  secret  determination, 
which  was  to  bear  fruit  later,  not  of  carrying  England 
with  them,  but  of  creating  something  which  should 
not  be  England. 

The  second  phase  of  Greater  Britain  was  brought 
on  by  the  military  revolution  of  1648.  After  the 
triumph  of  the  Commonwealth  at  home,  it  had  to 

^  See  au  excellent  account  of  his  schemes  in  Mr.  Besant'a 
Coligny. 

^  In  the  charter  of  Rhode  Island,  1663,  it  is  expressed  distinctly. 
Religious  liberty  is  granted  "  for  that  the  same  by  reason  of  the 
remote  distances  of  those  places  will,  as  \Vu  hope,  be  no  breach  of 
the  unity  and  uniformity  established  in  this  nation."  Charles  11, 
in  his  religious  policy  seems  always  to  keep  his  maternal  grand- 
father in  view. 

L 


146  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

wage  a  new  war  with  royalism  by  sea.  From  our 
point  of  view  this  second  contest  is  more  important 
than  the  first;  for  the  army  created  by  Cromwell 
was  destined  soon  to  dissolve  again,  but  the  maritime 
power  organised  by  Vane  and  wielded  by  Blake  is  the 
English  navy  of  all  later  time.  Our  maritime  ascend- 
ency has  its  beginning  here.  "  At  this  moment," 
says  Kanke,  "  England  awoke  more  clearly  than  ever 
before  to  a  consciousness  of  the  advantage  of  her 
geographical  position,  of  the  fact  that  a  maritime 
vocation  was  that  to  which  she  was  called  by  nature 
herself."  Cromwell's  attack  upon  the  Spanish  Empire 
and  seizure  of  Jamaica,  the  most  high-handed  measure 
recorded  in  the  modern  history  of  England,  is  the 
natural  effect  of  this  new  consciousness  awakening  at  a 
moment  when  England  found  herself  a  military  State. 
The  next  phase  is  the  duel  with  Holland.  This 
belongs  most  peculiarly  to  the  first  half  of  the  reign 
of  Charles  II.,  when  it  fills  the  foreground  of  the 
historic  stage ;  but  it  had  begun  long  before  at  the 
massacre  of  Amboyna  in  1623,  and  had  grown  in 
prominence  under  the  Commonwealth.  It  may  be 
said  to  end  in  the  year  1674,  when  Charles  II.  with- 
drew from  the  attack  on  Holland,  which  he  had  made 
in  combination  with  Louis  XIV.  That  was  a  great 
moment  of  glory  for  Holland,  when  in  such  extreme 
danger  she  found  a  new  champion  in  the  family  which 
had  saved  her  Ijefore,  when  a  new  Stadtholder,  a 
second  William  the  Silent,  stood  in  the  breach  to 
withstand  the  new  invasion.  Nevertheless  it  was 
the  beginning  of  the  decline  of  Holland.     For  in  this 


VII  PHASES  OF  EXPANSION  147 

second  great  struggle  of  the  Dutch  Republic,  though 
she  showed  the  old  heroism,  she  could  not  have 
all  the  old  good  fortune.  She  could  not  again 
positively  prosper  and  grow  rich  by  means  of  war, 
as  she  had  done  before.  This  time  she  was  at 
war  not  with  Spain,  the  possessor  of  infinite  colonies, 
which  she  could  plunder  at  leisure,  but  only  with 
France ;  her  fleet  did  not  now  sweep  the  seas  un- 
opposed, but  was  confronted  with  the  powerful  navy 
of  England ;  and  the  very  source  of  her  wealth,  her 
mercantile  marine,  was  struck  at  by  the  English 
Navigation  Act.  Accordingly,  though  she  saved  her- 
self, and  afterwards  had  another  age  of  great  deeds, 
the  decay  of  Holland  begins  now  to  set  in ;  it  becomes 
visible  to  all  the  world  at  the  death  of  her  great 
Stadtholder,  the  last  of  the  old  line,  our  William  III. 
England,  richer  by  nature,  and  not  tried  by  invasion, 
begins  now  to  draw  ahead,  and  the  6aKaa<T0Kparia 
of  Holland  terminates. 

The  reign  of  Charles  H.  stands  out  in  the  history 
of  Greater  Britain  as  a  period  of  remarkable  progress.^ 
It  was  then  especially  that  the  American  Colonies 
took  the  character  which  they  had  when  they 
attracted  so  much  attention  in  the  next  century,  of 
an  uninterrupted  series  of  settlements  extending 
from  South  to  North  along  the  Atlantic  coast.  For 
it  was  in  this  reign  that  the  Carolinas  and  Pennsyl- 
vania were  founded  and  that  the  Dutch  were  expelled 


'  "The  spirit  of  enterprise,"  writes  Mr.  Saintsbury,  "and  the 
desire  for  colonisation  appear  to  have  licen  almost  as  strong  at  that 
period  as  in  the  days  of  Elizabeth  and  James." 


148  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect 

from  New  York  and  Delaware.  Considered  as  a 
whole  and  judged  by  the  standard  of  the  time,  this 
American  settlement  begins  now  to  be  most  imposing. 
Its  distinction  is  that  it  has  a  population  which  is  at 
once  large  and  almost  purely  European.  Through- 
out the  Spanish  settlements  the  Europeans  Avere 
blended  and  lost  in  an  ocean  of  Indian  and  half-Indian 
population.  The  Dutch  colonies  naturally  wanted 
population,  because  the  Dutch  mother -country  was 
so  small ;  they  were  generally  little  moi'e  than 
commercial  stations.  The  French  colonies,  which 
now  begin  to  attract  attention,  were  also  weak  in 
this  respect.  Already  in  the  daAvn  of  French  colonial 
greatness  might  be  perceived  a  deficiency  in  genuine 
colonising  power,  and  perhaps  also  that  slowness  of 
multiplication  which  has  characterised  the  French 
since.  The  row  of  English  colonies  on  the  Atlantic 
was  perhaps  already  the  most  solid  achievement  in 
the  way  of  colonisation  that  any  European  state 
could  boast,  though  it  would  seem  insignificant 
enough  if  judged  by  a  modern  standard.  The  whole 
population  at  the  end  of  Charles  II. 's  reign  was  about 
two  hundred  thousand,  but  it  was  a  population 
which  doubled  itself  every  quarter  of  a  century. 

What  now  is  the  next  phase  of  Greater  Britain  1 
It  enters  now,  in  conjunction  with  Holland,  upon  a 
period  of  resistance  to  the  aggressions  of  Greater 
France  created  by  Colbert.  From  our  point  of  view 
the  administration  of  Colbert  means  the  deliberate 
entrance  of  France  into  the  competition  of  the 
Western  States  for  the  New  World.     France   had 


VII  PHASES  OF  EXPANSION  149 

not  been  much,  if  at  all,  behind  England  in  her  early 
explorations.  Jacqties  Cartier  had  made  himself  a 
name  earlier  than  Frobisher  and  Drake ;  Coligny  had 
had  schemes  of  colonisation  earlier  than  Kaleigh. 
Acadie  and  Canada  were  settled  and  the  town  of 
Quebec  founded  under  the  guidance  of  Samuel 
Champlain  about  the  time  of  the  voyage  of  the 
Mayflower.  But,  as  usual,  her  European  entangle- 
ments checked  the  progress  of  France  in  the  New 
World.  The  Thirty  Years'  War  had  given  her  an 
opportunity  of  laying  the  foundation  of  a  European 
Ascendency.  All  through  the  middle  of  that  century 
she  was  engaged  in  almost  uninterrupted  European 
war.  Of  the  great  Spanish  estate  which  is  in  liquid- 
ation she  leaves  the  colonial  part  to  Holland  and 
England,  because  she  naturally  covets  for  herself 
that  which  lies  close  to  her  frontier,  the  Burgundian 
part.  In  the  days  of  Cromwell  therefore  she  has 
fallen  somewhat  behind  in  the  colonial  race.  Mazarin 
seems  to  have  little  comprehension  of  the  oceanic 
policy  of  the  age.  But  as  soon  as  he  is  gone,  and 
the  war  is  over,  and  a  tranquil  period  has  set  in, 
Colbert  rises  to  guide  her  into  this  new  path.  He 
appropriates  all  the  great  commercial  inventions  of 
the  Dutch  Republic,  particularly  the  Chartered  Com- 
pany. He  labours,  and  for  a  time  with  success,  to 
give  to  France,  the  State  pre-eminently  of  feudalism, 
aristocracy  and  chivalry,  an  industrial  and  modern 
character,  such  as  the  attraction  of  the  New  World 
was  impressing  upon  the  maritime  states.  He  figures 
in  Adam  Smith  as  the  representative  statesman  of 


150  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect 

the  mercantile  system,  and  indeed,  as  the  minister  of 
Louis  XIV.,  he  seemed  to  embody  that  perversion  of 
the  commercial  spirit  which  filled  Europe  with  war, 
so  that,  as  Adam  Smith  himself  says,  "commerce, 
which  ought  naturally  to  be,  among  nations  as  among 
individuals,  a  bond  of  union  and  friendship,  has 
become  the  most  fertile  source  of  discord  and 
animosity." 

We  have  remarked  that  the  seventeenth  century 
is  controlled  by  two  great  forces,  of  which  one,  the 
Reformation,  is  decreasing,  while  the  other,  which  is 
the  attraction  of  the  New  World,  increases,  and  that 
the  student  must  continually  beware  of  attributing 
to  one  of  these  forces  results  produced  by  the  other. 
Thus  under  Cromwell,  as  under  Elizabeth  before  him, 
the  commercial  influence  works  disguised  under  the 
religious.  When  now,  later  in  the  century,  the  duel 
between  the  two  Sea -Powers  is  succeeded  by  their 
alliance  against  France,  we  have  once  more  to  unravel 
the  same  tangle  of  causation.  This  alliance  endured 
through  two  great  wars  and  through  two  English 
reigns,  and  it  seems,  when  we  trace  the  growth  of  it 
from  1674  to  the  Revolution  of  1688,  to  be  an  alliance 
of  the  two  Protestant  Powers  against  a  new  Catholic 
aggression.  For  in  those  years  there  set  in  one  of 
the  strangest  and  most  disastrous  reactions  that 
history  has  to  record.  The  Revocation  of  the  Edict 
of  Nantes  revived  the  politics  of  the  sixteenth 
century.  Coinciding  nearly  in  time  with  the  acces- 
sion of  the  Catholic  James  II.  in  England,  it  created 
a  world-wide  religious  panic.     History  seemed  to  be 


VII  PHASES  OF  EXPANSION  151 

rolled  back  just  a  century,  the  age  of  the  League, 
of  Philip  II.  and  William  the  Silent,  seemed  to  have 
returned,  at  a  time  when  it  was  thought  that  the 
balance  of  the  Confessions  had  been  established 
firmly  thirty  years  before  in  the  Treaty  of  Westphalia, 
and  when  the  age  had  during  those  thirty  years  been 
drifting  in  the  other  direction  of  colonial  expansion. 
The  ideas  of  Colbert  seem  suddenly  to  be  forgotten, 
the  wealth  he  has  amassed  is  wasted,  the  navy  he 
has  founded  is  exposed  to  destruction  at  La  Hogue. 
It  is  against  this  Catholic  Eevival  that  England  and 
Holland  first  form  their  alliance. 

But  it  was  only  for  a  moment,  and  less  really 
than  apparently,  that  the  New  World  was  thus 
pushed  into  the  background.  If  we  trace  history 
upward  instead  of  downward,  if  we  look  from  the 
Treaty  of  Utrecht  back  upon  the  alliance  of  the  Sea 
Powers  which  triumphed  there,  we  see  an  alliance  of 
quite  a  different  kind.  There  has  been  no  breach  of 
continuity;  Marlborough  has  the  same  position  as 
William,  and  the  alliance  is  stiU  directed  against  the 
same  Louis  XIV.  But  the  religious  warmth  has 
faded  out  of  the  war,  which  now  betrays  by  the 
settlement  made  at  Utrecht  its  intensely  commercial 
character.  That  war  h^s  such  a  splendour  in  our 
annals,  and  the  title  we  give  it,  "  War  of  the  Spanish 
Succession,"  has  such  a  monarchical  ring,  tliat  we 
think  it  a  good  sample  of  the  fantastic,  barbaric, 
wasteful  wars  of  the  olden  time.  It  is  of  this  war 
that  "  little  Peterkin  "  desires  to  know  "  what  good 
came  of  it  at  last."     In  reality  it  is  the  most  business- 


152  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LECT. 

like  of  all  our  wars,  and  it  was  waged  in  the  interest 
of  English  and  Dutch  merchants  whose  trade  and 
livelihood  were  at  stake.  All  those  colonial  questions, 
which  had  been  setting  Europe  at  discord  ever  since 
the  New  World  was  laid  open,  were  brought  to  a 
head  at  once  by  the  prospect  of  a  union  between 
France  and  the  Spanish  Empire,  for  such  a  union 
would  close  almost  the  whole  New  World  to  the 
English  and  Dutch,  and  throw  it  open  to  the 
countrymen  of  Colbert,  who  were  at  that  moment 
exploring  and  settling  the  Mississippi.  Behind  all 
the  courtly  foppery  of  the  Grand  Si^cle  commercial 
considerations  now  rule  the  world  as  they  had  never 
ruled  it  before,  and  as  they  continued  to  rule  it 
through  much  of  the  prosaic  century  that  was  then 
opening. 

In  the  midst  of  this  war  a  memorable  event  befell, 
which  belongs  to  this  development  in  the  fullest 
sense,  the  legislative  union  of  England  and  Scotland. 
Eead  the  history  of  it  in  Burton ;  you  will  see  that 
it  marks  the  beginning  of  modern  Scottish  history, 
just  as  the  Armada  that  of  modern  English  history. 
It  is  the  entrance  of  Scotland  into  the  competition 
for  the  New  World.  No  nation  has  since,  in  propor- 
tion to  its  numbers,  reaped  so  much  profit  from  the 
New  World  as  the  Scotch,  but  before  the  Union 
they  had  no  position  there.  They  were  excluded 
from  the  English  trade,  and  the  poverty  of  the 
country  did  not  allow  them  successfully  to  compete 
with  the  other  nations  on  their  own  account.  In 
William    III.'s    reign   they   made   a  great   national 


VII  PHASES  OF  EXPANSION  153 

effort  on  the  plan  then  usual.  They  tried  to  appro- 
priate to  themselves  a  territory  in  the  New  World. 
They  set  up  the  Darien  Company,  which  was  to 
carve  a  piece  for  the  benefit  of  Scotland  out  of  the 
huge  territory  claimed  by  Spain  as  its  own.  This 
enterprise  failed,  and  it  was  out  of  the  excitement 
and  disappointment  caused  by  the  failure  that  the 
negotiations  arose  which  ended  in  the  Union.  England 
gained  by  the  Union  security  in  time  of  war  against 
a  domestic  foe ;  Scotland  gained  admission  into  the 
New  World. 

In  the  history  of  the  expansion  of  England  one 
of  the  greatest  epochs  is  marked  by  the  Treaty  of 
Utrecht.  In  our  survey  this  date  stands  out  almost 
as  prominently  as  the  date  of  the  Spanish  Armada, 
for  it  marks  the  beginning  of  England's  supremacy 
At  the  time  of  the  Armada  we  saw  England  enter- 
ing the  race  for  the  first  time ;  at  Utrecht  England 
wins  the  race.  Then  she  had  the  audacity  to  defy 
a  power  far  greater  than  her  own,  and  her  success 
brought  her  forward  and  gave  her  a  place  among 
great  states.  She  had  advanced  steadily  since,  but  in 
the  first  half  of  the  seventeenth  century  Holland  had 
attracted  more  attention  and  admiration,  and  in  the 
second  half  France.  From  about  1660  to  1700 
France  had  been  the  first  state  in  the  world  beyond 
all  dispute.  But  the  Treaty  of  Utrcclit  left  England 
the  first  state  in  the  world,  and  she  continued  for 
some  years  to  be  first  without  a  rival.  Her  reputa- 
tion in  other  countries,  the  respect  felt  for  her  claims 
in  literature,  philosophy,  scholarship  and  science,  date 


154  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lbct. 

from  this  period.  If  ever,  it  was  after  this  time  that 
she  held  the  same  kind  of  intellectual  primacy  which 
France  had  held  before.  Much  of  this  splendour  was 
transient,  but  England  has  remained  ever  since  that 
date  on  a  higher  level  than  ever  before.  It  has  been 
universally  allowed  ever  since  that  no  state  is  more 
powerful  than  England.  But  especially  it  has  been 
admitted  that  in  wealth  and  commerce  and  in  maritime 
power,  no  state  is  equal  to  her.  This  was  partly 
because  her  rivals  had  fallen  off  in  power,  partly 
because  she  herself  had  advanced. 

The  decline  of  Holland  had  by  this  time  become 
perceptible.  So  long  as  William  lived,  she  enjoyed 
the  benefit  of  his  renown.  But  in  Marlborough's 
time,  and  from  that  time  forward,  languor  and  the 
desire  of  repose  grow  upon  her.  Her  powers  have 
been  overstrained  in  war  with  France  and  in  competi- 
tion with  England.  Never  again  does  she  display  her 
old  energy.  Thus  the  old  rival  has  fallen  behind. 
The  new  rival,  France,  is  for  the  moment  over- 
whelmed by  the  disasters  of  the  war,  and  she,  whose 
affairs  thirty  years  before  had  been  set  in  order  by 
the  greatest  financier  of  the  age,  is  now  burdened 
with  a  bankruptcy  she  will  carry  with  her  to  the 
Revolution.  Her  bold  snatch  at  the  trade  of  the 
New  World  has  not  succeeded.  She  has  in  a  sense 
won  Spain,  but  not  that  which  made  Spain  valuable, 
viz.  a  share  in  the  American  monopoly.  Some  part 
of  the  loss  was  indeed  soon  to  be  repaired.  France 
was  soon  to  show  much  colonial  enterprise  and 
intelligence.     Dupleix  in  India,  La  Galissoni^re  in 


vu  PHASES  OF  EXPANSION  155 

Canada,  the  Bailli  Suffren  on  the  sea,  were  to  carry 
the  name  of  France  high  in  the  New  World  and 
maintain  for  a  long  time  an  equal  competition  with 
England.  But  at  the  moment  of  the  Peace  of 
Utrecht  so  much  could  hardly  have  been  foreseen. 
Fresh  from  her  victories,  England  seemed  at  that 
moment  even  greater  than  she  was. 

The  positive  gains  of  England  were  Acadie,  or 
Nova  Scotia,  and  Newfoundland  (surrendered  by 
France)  and  the  Asiento  Compact  granted  by  Spain. 
In  other  words,  the  first  step  was  taken  towards  the 
destruction  of  Greater  France  by  depriving  her  of 
one  of  her  three  settlements,  Acadie,  Canada,  and 
Louisiana,  in  North  America,  And  the  first  great 
breach  was  made  in  that  intolerable  Spanish  mono- 
poly, which  then  closed  the  greater  part  of  Central 
and  Southern  America  to  the  trade  of  the  world. 
England  was  allowed  to  furnish  Spanish  America 
with  slaves,  and  along  with  slaves  she  soon  managed 
to  smuggle  in  other  commodities. 

I  must  pause  here  for  a  moment  to  make  a  general 
observation.  You  will  remark  that  in  this  survey  of 
the  growth  of  Greater  Britain  I  do  not  make  the 
smallest  attempt,  either  to  glorify  the  conquests 
made,  or  to  justify  the  means  adopted  by  our 
countrymen,  any  more  than,  when  I  point  out  that 
England  outstripped  her  four  rivals  in  the  competi- 
tion, I  have  the  smallest  thought  of  claiming  for 
England  any  superior  virtue  or  valour.  I  have  not 
called  upon  you  to  admire  or  approve  Drake  or 
Hawkins,  or  the  Commonwealth  or  Cromwell,  or  the 


156  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

Government  of  Charles  II.  Indeed  it  is  not  easy  to 
approve  the  conduct  of  those  who  built  up  Greater 
Britain,  though  there  is  plenty  to  admire  in  their 
achievements,  and  much  less  certainly  to  blame  or  to 
shudder  at  than  in  the  deeds  of  the  Spanish  adven- 
turers. But  I  am  not  writing  the  biography  of  these 
men ;  it  is  not  as  a  biographer  nor  as  a  poet  nor  as 
a  moralist  that  I  deal  with  their  actions.  I  am  con- 
cerned always  with  a  single  problem  only,  that  of 
causation.  My  question  always  is,  How  came  this 
enterprise  to  be  undertaken,  how  came  it  to  svucceed  1 
I  ask  it  not  in  order  that  we  may  imitate  the  actions 
we  read  of,  but  in  order  that  we  may  discover  the 
laws  by  which  states  rise,  expand  and  prosper  or  fall 
in  this  world.  In  this  instance  I  have  also  the 
further  object,  viz.  to  throw  light  on  the  question 
whether  Greater  Britain,  now  that  it  exists,  may  be 
expected  to  prosper  and  endure  or  to  fall.  Perhaps 
you  may  ask  whether  we  can  expect  or  wish  it  to 
prosper,  if  crime  has  gone  to  the  making  of  it.  But 
the  God  who  is  revealed  in  history  does  not  usually 
judge  in  this  way.  History  does  not  show  that 
conquests  made  lawlessly  in  one  generation  are 
certain  or  even  likely  to  be  lost  again  in  another  : 
and,  as  government  is  never  to  be  confounded  with 
property,  it  does  not  appear  that  states  have  always 
even  a  right,  much  less  that  they  are  bound,  to 
restore  gains  that  may  be  more  or  less  ill-gotten. 
The  Norman  conquest  was  lawless  enough,  yet  it 
prospered  and  prospered  permanently ;  we  ourselves 
own  this  land  of  England  by  inheritance  from  Saxon 


vn  PHASES  OF  EXPANSION  157 

pirates.  The  title  of  a  nation  to  its  territory  is 
generally  to  be  sought  in  primitive  times,  and  would 
be  found,  if  we  could  recover  it,  to  rest  upon  violence 
and  massacre ;  the  territory  of  Greater  Britain  was 
acquired  in  the  full  light  of  history  and  in  part  by 
unjustifiable  means,  but  less  unrighteously  than  the 
territory  of  many  other  Powers,  and  perhaps  far  less 
unrighteously  than  that  of  those  states  whose  power 
is  now  most  ancient  and  established.  If  we  compare 
it  with  other  Empires  in  respect  of  its  origin,  we 
shall  see  that  it  has  arisen  in  the  same  way  ;  that  its 
founders  have  had  the  same  motives,  and  these  not 
mainly  noble  ;  that  they  have  displayed  much  fierce 
covetousness,  mixed  with  heroism ;  that  they  have 
not  been  much  troubled  by  moral  scruples,  at  least  in 
their  dealings  with  enemies  and  rivals,  though  they 
have  often  displayed  virtuous  self-denial  iu  their 
dealings  among  themselves.  So  far  we  shall  find 
Greater  Britain  to  be  like  other  Empires,  and  like 
other  states  of  whose  origin  we  have  any  knowledge  ; 
but  its  annals  are  on  the  whole  better,  not  worse, 
than  those  of  most.  They  are  conspicuously  better 
than  those  of  Greater  Spain,  which  are  infinitely 
more  stained  with  cruelty  and  rapacity.  In  some 
pages  of  these  annals  there  is  a  real  elevation  of 
thought  and  an  intention  at  least  of  righteous  deal- 
ing, which  are  not  often  met  with  in  the  history  of 
colonisation.  Some  of  these  founders  remind  us  of 
Abraham  and  Aeneas.  The  crimes  on  the  other 
hand  are  such  as  have  been  almost  universal  in 
colonisation. 


158  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

I  make  these  remarks  in  this  place  because  I  have 
now  before  me  the  greatest  of  these  crimes.  England 
had  taken  some  share  in  the  slave-trade  as  early  as 
Elizabeth's  age,  when  John  Hawkins  distinguished 
himself  as  the  first  Englishman  who  stained  his  hands 
with  its  atrocity.  You  will  find  in  Hakluyt  his  own 
narrative,  how  he  came  in  1567  upon  an  African 
town,  of  which  the  huts  were  covered  with  dry  palm- 
leaves,  how  he  set  fire  to  it,  and  out  of  "  8000 
inhabitants  succeeded  in  seizing  250  persons,  men, 
women  and  children."  But  we  are  not  to  suppose 
that  from  that  time  until  the  abolition  of  the  slave- 
trade  England  took  a  great  or  leading  share  in  it. 
England  had  then,  and  for  nearly  half  a  century 
afterwards,  no  colonies  in  which  there  could  be  a 
demand  for  slaves,  and  when  she  acquired  colonies 
they  were  not  mining  colonies  like  the  first  colonies 
of  Spain,  in  which  the  demand  for  slaves  had  been 
urgent.  Like  our  colonial  empire  itself,  our  parti- 
cipation in  the  slave-trade  was  the  gradual  growth  of 
the  seventeenth  century.  By  the  Treaty  of  Utrecht 
it  was,  as  it  were,  established,  and  became  "  a  central 
object  of  English  policy."^  From  this  date  I  am 
afraid  we  took  the  leading  share,  and  stained  our- 
selves beyond  other  nations  in  the  monstrous  and 
enormous  atrocities  of  the  slave-trade. 

This  simply  means  that  we  were  not  better  in  our 
principles  in  this  respect  than  other  nations,  and  that. 
having  now  at  last  risen  to  the  highest  place  among 

*  Tlie  plirase  is  borrowed  from  Mr.  Lecky.  See  History  of 
England  in  the  Jiighteenth  Century,  ii.  p.  13. 


VII  PHASES  OF  EXPANSION  159 

the  trading-nations  of  the  world,  and  having  extorted 
the  Asiento  from  Spain  by  our  military  successes,  we 
accidentally  obtained  the  largest  share  in  this  wicked 
commerce.  It  is  fair  that  we  should  bear  this  in 
mind  while  we  read  the  horror-striking  stories  which 
the  party  of  Abolition  afterwards  published.  Our 
guilt  in  this  matter  was  shared  by  all  the  colonising 
nations  ;  Ave  were  not  the  inventors  of  the  crime,  and, 
if  within  a  certain  period  we  were  more  guilty  than 
other  nations,  it  is  some  palliation  that  we  published 
our  own  guilt,  repented  of  it,  and  did  at  last  renounce 
it.  But  taken  together,  the  whole  successful  develop- 
ment which  culminated  at  Utrecht  secularised  and 
materialised  the  English  people  as  nothing  had  ever 
done  before.  Never  were  sordid  motives  so  supreme, 
never  was  religion  and  every  high  influence  so  much 
discredited,  as  in  the  thirty  years  that  followed. 
There  has  been  a  disposition  to  antedate  this  corrup- 
tion, and  to  attribute  it  to  the  wrong  cause.  It  was 
not  so  much  after  the  Restoration,  as  after  the 
Revolution,  and  especially  after  the  reign  of  Queen 
Anne,  that  cynicism  and  corruption  set  in.  In  his 
well-known  essay  on  "the  Comic  Dramatists  of  the 
Restoration  "  Macaulay  attributes  to  the  Restoration 
the  cynicism  of  four  writers,  Wycherley,  Congreve, 
Vanbrugh,  and  Farquhar,  of  which  writers  three  did 
not  write  a  play  till  several  years  after  the  Revolu- 
tion ! 

We  have  arrived  then  at  the  stage  when  England, 
in  the  course  of  her  expansion,  stands  out  for  the 
first  time  as  the  supreme  maritime  and  commercial 


160  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lbct. 

Power  in  the  World.  It  is  evidently  her  connection 
with  the  New  World  that  has  given  her  this  char- 
acter ;  nevertheless  she  did  not  yet  appear  at  least 
to  ordinary  eyes  as  absolutely  the  first  colonial 
Power.  In  extent  her  territories  were  still  insignifi- 
cant by  the  side  of  those  of  Spain,  and  much  inferior 
to  those  of  Portugal.  They  were  but  a  fringe  on  the 
Atlantic  coast  of  North  America,  a  few  Western 
Islands  and  a  few  commercial  stations  in  India. 
What  was  this  compared  with  the  mighty  vice- 
royalties  of  Spain  in  Southern  and  Central  America  1 
And,  as  I  have  said  before,  France  as  a  colonial 
Power  might  seem  in  some  respects  superior  to 
England ;  her  colonial  policy  might  seem  more  able 
and  likely  in  the  end  to  be  more  successful. 

The  next  stage  in  the  history  of  Greater  Britain 
is  one  which  I  have  already  surveyed.  Holland 
being  now  in  decline,  the  rivalry  of  England  is  hence- 
forth with  Spain  and  France,  Powers  henceforth 
united  by  a  Family  Compact.  But  the  pressure  of  it 
falls  mainly  on  France,  since  it  is  France,  not  Spain, 
that  is  neighbour  to  England  both  in  America  and 
in  India.  That  duel  of  France  and  England  begins, 
which  I  have  already  described.  The  decisive  event 
of  it  is  the  Seven  Years'  War  and  the  new  position 
given  to  England  by  the  Treaty  of  Paris  in  1762. 
Here  is  the  culminating  point  of  English  power  in 
the  eighteenth  century;  nay,  relatively  to  other 
states  England  has  never  since  been  so  great.  For  a 
moment  it  seems  that  the  whole  of  North  America  is 
destined  to  be  hers,  and  to  make  for  ever  a  part  of 


VII  PHASES  OF  EXPANSION  161 

Greater  Britain.  Such  an  Empire  would  not  have 
been  greater  in  mere  extent  than  that  which  Spain 
abeady  possessed;  but  in  essential  greatness  and 
power  how  infinitely  superior  !  The  Spanish  Empire 
had  the  fundamental  defect  of  not  being  European 
in  blood.  Not  only  did  the  part  of  the  population 
which  was  European  belong  to  a  race  which  even  in 
Europe  appeared  to  be  in  decline,  but  there  was 
another  large  part  which  had  a  mixture  of  barbarism 
in  its  blood,  and  another  larger  still  whose  blood  was 
purely  barbaric.  The  English  Empire  was  through- 
out of  civilised  blood,  except  so  far  as  it  had  a  slave- 
population.  But  the  example  of  antiquity  shows 
that  a  separate  slave-caste,  discharging  all  drudgery 
and  unskilled  labour,  is  consistent  with  a  very  high 
form  of  civilisation.  Much  more  serious  is  the  de- 
terioration of  the  national  type  by  barbaric  inter- 
mixture. 

In  this  culminating  phase  England  becomes  an 
object  of  jealousy  and  dread  to  all  Europe,  as  Spain 
and  afterwards  France  had  been  in  the  seventeenth 
century.  It  was  about  the  time  when  she  won  her 
first  victories  in  the  colonial  duel  with  France,  that 
an  outcry  began  to  be  raised  against  her  as  the 
tyrant  of  the  seas.  In  1745,  just  after  the  capture 
of  Louisburg,  the  French  Ambassador  at  St.  Peters- 
burg handed  in  a  note,  in  which  he  complained  of 
the  maritime  despotism  of  the  English,  and  their 
purpose  of  destroying  the  trade  and  navigation  of  all 
other  nations ;  he  asserted  the  necessity  of  a  com- 
bination to  maintain  the  maritime  balance.  England's 

M 


162  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LECT. 

former  ally  joins  in  the  complaint,  for  there  appeared 
about  the  same  time  a  pamphlet  entitled  "ia  voix  d'un 
citoyen  h  Amsterdam"  in  which  the  cry  Delenda  est 
Carthago,  formerly  raised  by  Shaftesbury  against 
Holland,  is  now  echoed  back  by  a  certain  Maubert 
against  England.  "  Mettons  nous,"  he  exclaims,  "  avec 
la  France  au  niveau  de  la  Grande  Bretagne,  en- 
richissons-nous  de  ses  propres  f antes  et  du  d^lire 
ambitieux  de  ses  Ministres."  And  then  he  suggests  a 
Coalition  for  the  purpose  of  procuring  the  repeal  of 
the  Navigation  Act.  From  this  time  till  1815 
jealousy  of  England  is  one  of  the  great  motive  forces 
of  European  politics.  It  led  to  the  intervention  of 
France  in  America,  and  to  the  Armed  Neutrality; 
later  it  became  a  kind  of  passion  in  the  mind  of  the 
First  Napoleon,  and  lured  him  gradually  on,  partly 
against  his  will,  to  make  the  conquest  of  Europe. 

So  far  we  have  traced  a  course  of  uninterrupted 
continuous  expansion.  Slowly  but  surely  England 
has  grown  greater  and  greater.  But  now  occurs  an 
event  wholly  new  in  kind,  a  sudden  shock,  proving 
that  in  the  New  World  there  might  be  other  hostile 
Powers  beside  the  rival  States  of  Europe.  The 
secession  of  the  American  colonies  is  one  of  those 
events,  the  immense  significance  of  which  could  not 
even  at  the  moment  be  overlooked.  It  was  felt  at 
the  time  to  be  pregnant  with  infinite  consequences, 
and  so  it  has  proved,  though  the  consequences  have 
not  been  precisely  of  the  kind  that  was  expected.  It 
was  the  first  stirring  of  free-will  on  the  part  of  the 
New  World  Avhich  had  remained,  since  Columbus 


VII  PHASES  OF  EXPANSION  163 

discovered  it,  and  since  the  Spanish  Adventurers 
ruthlessly  destroyed  whatever  germs  of  civilisation  it 
possessed,  in  a  kind  of  nonage.  But  now  it  asserts 
itself ;  it  accomplishes  a  revolution  in  the  European 
style,  appealing  to  all  the  principles  of  European 
civilisation.  This  was  in  itself  a  stupendous  event, 
perhaps  in  itself  greater  than  that  French  EeA'-olution, 
which  followed  so  soon  and  absorbed  so  completely 
the  attention  of  mankind.  But  it  might  have  seemed 
at  the  moment  to  be  the  fall  of  Greater  Britain.  For 
the  thirteen  colonies  which  then  seceded  were  almost 
all  the  then  colonial  Empire  of  Britain.  And  their 
secession  seemed  at  the  moment  a  proof  demonstra- 
tive that  any  Greater  Britain  of  the  kind  must  always 
be  unnatural  and  short-lived.  Nevertheless  a  century 
has  passed  and  there  is  still  a  Greater  Britain,  and 
on  more  than  the  old  scale  of  magnitude. 

This  event  will  be  the  subject  of  the  next  lecture. 


LECTUEE  VIII 

SCHISM  IN  GREATER  BRITAIN 

As  objects  change  their  outline  when  the  observer 
changes  his  point  of  view,  so  the  history  of  a  state 
may  be  made  to  take  many  forms.  The  outline  I 
have  given  of  English  history  in  the  seventeenth  and 
eighteenth  centuries  is  very  different  from  that  with 
which  we  are  familiar,  because  I  have  taken  a  point 
of  view  from  which  many  things  seem  great  that 
before  seemed  small,  and  many  small  that  seemed 
great,  while  some  things  are  now  outline  that  were 
shading,  and  others  are  shading  that  were  outline. 

And  yet  most  people  think  of  history  as  if  its 
outline  were  quite  fixed  and  unalterable.  Details, 
they  think,  may  be  more  or  less  accurate,  more  or  less 
vivid,  in  this  historian  or  in  that,  but  the  framework 
must  be  the  same  for  all  historians.  In  reality  it  is 
just  this  framework,  the  list  of  great  events  which 
children  learn  by  heart,  that  is  unfixed,  unstable, 
alterable,  though  it  seems  made  of  cast-iron.  For 
what  makes  an  event  great  or  little  1    Is  the  acces- 


LECT,  viii        SCHISM  IN  GREATEE  BRITAIN  165 

sion  of  a  king  necessarily  a  great  event?  At  the 
moment  it  seems  great,  but  when  the  excitement  it 
causes  has  subsided,  it  may  appear  to  have  been  in 
the  history  of  the  country  no  event  at  all.  This 
principle  consistently  applied  would  produce  a  re- 
volution in  our  ideas  of  history.  It  would  show  us 
that  the  real  history  of  a  state  may  be  quite  different 
from  the  conventional,  since  all  or  many  of  the  events 
that  have  passed  for  great  may  be  really  unimportant, 
and  the  truly  important  events  may  be  among  those 
which  have  been  slightly  or  not  at  all  recorded. 

We  must  have  then  a  test  for  the  historical  im- 
portance of  events,  and  to  apply  this  test  will  be  a 
principal  part  of  the  historian's  task.  Now  what 
test  shall  we  apply  1  Shall  we  say,  "  The  historian 
should  make  prominent  those  events  which  are 
interesting  i"  But  surely  an  occurrence  may  be  inter- 
esting biographically,  or  morally,  or  poetically,  and 
yet  not  interesting  historically.  Shall  we  say  then, 
"  He  is  to  give  to  events  the  importance  they  were 
felt  to  have  at  the  moment  when  they  happened ;  he 
is  to  revive  the  emotion  of  the  time  "1  I  maintain 
that  it  is  not  the  business  of  the  historian,  as  we  so 
often  hear,  to  put  his  reader  back  in  the  past  time,  or 
to  make  him  regard  events  as  they  were  regarded  by 
contemporaries.  Where  woidd  be  the  use  of  this'? 
Great  events  are  commonly  judged  by  contemporaries 
quite  wrongly.  It  is  in  fact  one  of  the  chief  functions 
of  the  historian  to  correct  this  contemporary  judg- 
ment. Instead  of  making  us  share  the  emotions  of 
the  passing  time,  it  is  his  business  to  point  out  to  us 


166  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

that  this  event,  which  absorbed  the  public  attention 
when  it  happened,  was  really  of  no  great  importance, 
and  that  event,  though  it  passed  almost  unnoticed, 
was  of  infinite  consequence. 

Of  all  events  of  English  history  it  is  perhaps  the 
American  Revolution  that  has  suffered  most  from  the 
application  of  these  wrong  tests.  Considered  as  a 
mere  story  or  romance,  it  is  not  so  very  interesting. 
There  is  no  very  wonderful  generalship,  no  very 
glorious  victory  on  either  side,  and  of  all  heroes 
Washington  is  the  least  dramatic.  We  forget  that 
what  is  not  very  thrilling  as  story  may  be  of  profound 
interest  as  history.  It  marks  our  blindness  to  this 
distinction  that  we  rank  the  French  Revolution, 
because  of  its  abundance  of  personal  incidents,  so 
much  before  the  American.  But  I  think  the  other 
cause  of  error  I  mentioned  operates  in  this  case  even 
more  fatally.  The  historian  must  not  indeed  be  a 
novelist,  but  it  is  as  bad,  if  not  worse,  for  him  to  be 
a  mere  newspaper  politician.  The  average  contem- 
porary view  of  a  great  event  is  almost  certain  to  be 
shallow  and  false.  And  yet  it  seems  to  be  the 
ambition  of  our  historians  to  estimate  the  American 
Revolution  just  as  they  would  have  done  had  they 
been  members  of  Parliament  at  the  time  of  the 
administration  of  Lord  North.  Instead  of  trying  to 
give  the  philosophy  of  it  and  to  assign  to  the  event 
its  due  importance  in  the  history  of  the  world,  they 
seem  always  making  up  their  minds  how  it  would 
have  been  their  duty  to  vote  at  this  stage  of  the 
proceedings  or  at  that,  on  the  Repeal  of  the  Stamp 


VIII  SCHISM  IN  GREATER  BRITAIN  167 

Act,  or  the  Boston  Port  Bill,  or  the  Compromise  Act. 
I  call  this  the  newspaper  treatment  of  affairs.  It 
waits  upon  the  parliamentary  debates,  and  has  an 
eye  to  the  fate  of  the  Ministry  and  to  the  result  of 
the  next  division.  In  particular  it  takes  up  and 
dismisses  questions  as  they  come,  and  on  each  it 
contents  itself  with  the  smattering  of  information 
which  may  suffice  for  the  short  space  that  the 
question  may  remain  under  discussion.  All  this  may 
be  well  enough  in  its  place,  but  it  produces  the  most 
melancholy  effect  in  historical  writing.  And  yet  in 
the  modern  periods  of  England  history  seems  to  aim 
only  at  perpetuating  such  ordinary  superficial  views 
of  the  moment.  It  is  deeply  infected  throughout 
with  the  commonplaces  of  party  politics,  and  in 
discussing  the  greatest  questions  seems  always  to 
take  for  its  model  the  newspaper  leading-article. 

What  then  is  the  true  test  of  the  historical 
importance  of  events?  I  say,  it  is  their  pregnancy, 
or  in  other  words  the  greatness  of  the  consequences 
likely  to  follow  from  them.  On  this  principle  I  have 
argued  that  in  the  eighteenth  century  the  expansion 
of  England  is  historically  far  more  important  than  all 
domestic  questions  and  movements.  Look  at  the 
great  personage  who  dominates  English  politics 
through  the  whole  middle  period  of  that  century,  the 
elder  Pitt.  His  greatness  is  throughout  identified 
with  the  expansion  of  England ;  he  is  a  statesman  of 
Greater  Britain.  It  is  in  the  buccaneering  war  with 
Spain  that  he  sows  his  political  wild  oats  ;  his  glory  is 
won  in  the  great  colonial  duel  with  France ;  his  old  age 


168  EXPA2TSI0N  OF  ENGLAND  LBOT. 

is    spent    in    striving  to    avert    schism    in  Greater 
Britain. 

Look  now  at  the  American  Eevolution.  In 
pregnancy  this  event  is  evidently  unique.  So  it  has 
always  struck  impartial  observers  at  a  distance.  But 
the  newspaper  politicians  of  the  day  had  no  time  for 
such  large  views.  To  them  it  presented  itself  only  in 
detail,  as  a  series  of  questions  upon  which  Parliament 
would  divide.  These  questions  came  before  them 
mixed  up  inextricably  with  other  questions,  often  of 
the  pettiest  kind,  yet  at  the  moment  not  less  im- 
portant as  practical  questions  of  party  politics.  It  is 
well  known  that  the  Stamp  Act  passed  at  first  almost 
without  notice.  A  Parliament  which  discussed  one 
night  the  Address,  another  night  listened  to  declama- 
tions on  the  back-stairs  influence  of  Bute  and  covert 
attacks  on  the  Princess  Dowager,  another  night 
excited  itself  over  Wilkes  and  General  "Warrants, 
found  on  the  Order  of  the  Day  a  proposal  for  taxing 
the  colonies,  and  passed  it  as  a  matter  of  course  with 
as  little  attention  as  is  now  given  to  the  Indian 
Budget.  This  is  deplorable  enough,  though  it  may 
be  difficult  to  remedy.  But  what  excuse  can  there 
be  for  introducing  into  history  such  a  preposterous 
confusion  of  small  things  with  great  1  And  yet 
consider  whether  by  our  artless  chronological  method, 
and  by  the  slavish  obsequiousness  with  which  our 
historians  follow  the  order  of  business  fixed  by  Parlia- 
ment, we  do  not  really  make  much  the  same  mistake 
in  estimating  the  American  Revolution  that  was 
made    by   those   who   jJassed  the   Stamp    Act  with 


viri  SCHISM  IN  GREATER  BRITAIN  169 

scarcely  a  division.  The  American  question  is 
introduced  in  our  histories  almost  as  irrationally  as 
it  was  introduced  at  the  time  into  Parliament;  it 
is  introduced  without  any  preparation,  and  in  mere 
chronological  order  among  other  questions  wholly 
unlike  it.  What  is  the  use  of  history,  if  it  does  not 
protect  us  in  reviewing  the  past  from  those  surprises 
which  in  the  politics  of  the  day  arise  inevitably  out 
of  the  vastness  and  multiplicity  of  modern  states  1 
And  yet  the  American  Revolution  surprises  us  now 
in  the  reading  as  much  as  it  did  our  forefathers  when 
it  happened.  We  too,  as  we  read,  have  our  heads 
full  of  Bute's  influence,  of  the  king's  marriage,  of  the 
king's  illness,  of  Wilkes  and  General  Warrants,  when 
suddenly  emerges  the  question  of  taxing  the  American 
colonies.  Soon  after  we  hear  of  discontent  in  the 
colonies.  And  then  we  say,  just  as  our  forefathers 
did,  "  By  the  way  what  are  these  colonies,  and  how 
did  they  come  into  existence,  and  how  are  they 
governed  1"  The  historian,  just  as  a  daily  paper 
might  do,  undertakes  to  post  us  up  in  the  subject. 
He  stops  and  inserts  at  this  point  a  retrospective 
chapter,  in  which  he  informs  us  that  the  country 
really  has,  and  has  long  had,  colonies  in  North 
America !  He  imparts  to  us  just  as  much  informa- 
tion about  these  colonies  as  may  enable  us  to  under- 
stand the  debates  now  about  to  open  on  the  repeal  of 
the  Stamp  Act,  and  then,  apologising  for  his  departure 
from  chronological  order,  he  hurries  back  to  his 
narrative.  In  this  narrative  he  seems  always  to 
watch  proceedings  from  the  reporters'  gallery  in  the 


170  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot 

House  of  Commons.  You  would  think  it  was  in 
Parliament  that  the  Eevolution  took  place.  America 
is  the  great  question  of  the  Eockingham  Cabinet, 
then  later  of  the  North  Cabinet.  The  final  loss  of 
America  is  considered  very  important  because  it 
brings  down  the  North  Cabinet ! 

When  he  relates  the  conclusion  of  the  Treaty  of 
1783,  the  historian  will  no  doubt  pause  for  a  moment 
and  insert  a  solemn  paragraph  upon  the  event,  which 
he  will  recognise  as  momentous.  He  will  explain 
that  colonies  always  secede  as  soon  as  they  feel  them- 
selves ripe  for  independence,  and  that  the  secession 
of  America  was  no  loss  but  rather  a  gain  for  England 
Hereupon  he  dismisses  the  subject,  and  henceforth 
you  hear  as  little  of  America  from  him  as  you 
heard  before  the  troubles  began.  New  subjects  have 
cropped  up  in  the  House  of  Commons.  He  is  busy 
with  the  stormy  debates  on  the  India  Bill,  the 
struggle  of  young  Pitt  with  the  Coalition,  the  West- 
minster Election,  and  a  little  later  the  Eegency 
Debates.  For  the  English  historian  is  as  much 
fascinated  by  Parliament,  and  pursues  all  its  move- 
ments with  the  same  reverential  attention,  as  the  old 
historians  of  France  show  in  following  the  personal 
m  0 vements  of  Louis  XIV.  When  at  last  he  reaches  the 
wars  of  the  French  Eevolution,  and  the  great  struggle  of 
England  with  Napoleon,  then  indeed  he  leaves  behind 
him  finally  the  inglorious  campaigns  of  Burgoyne 
and  Cornwallis,  and  rejoices  once  more  to  have  to 
record  really  great  events  and  the  deeds  of  great  men. 

Now  I  do  not  think  I  risk  anything  by  saying  in 


VIII  SCHISM  m  GREATER  BRITAIN  171 

contradiction  to  all  this  that  the  American  Revolution, 
instead  of  being  a  tiresome  unfortunate  business 
which  may  be  despatched  in  a  very  brief  narrative,  is 
an  event  not  only  of  greater  importance,  but  on  an 
altogether  higher  level  of  importance  than  almost 
any  other  in  modem  English  history,  and  that  it  is 
intrinsically  much  more  memorable  to  us  than  our 
great  war  with  Revolutionary  France,  which  indeed 
only  arrives  to  be  at  all  comparable  to  it  through  the 
vast  indirect  consequences  produced  necessarily  by  a 
war  on  so  large  a  scale  and  continued  so  long.  No 
doubt  it  is  much  more  stirring  to  read  of  the 
Nile,  Trafalgar,  the  Peninsula  and  "Waterloo,  than  of 
Bunker's  Hill,  Brandywine,  Saratoga  and  Yorktown, 
and  this  not  only  because  we  like  better  to  think  of 
victory  than  of  defeat,  but  also  because  in  a  military 
sense  the  struggle  with  France  was  greater  and  more 
interesting  than  that  with  America,  and  Napoleon, 
Nelson  and  Wellington  were  greater  commanders 
than  those  who  appeared  in  the  American  Revolution. 
But  events  take  rank  in  history  not  as  they  are  stir- 
ring or  exciting,  much  less  as  they  are  gratifying  to 
ourselves,  but  as  they  are  pregnant  with  consequences. 
The  American  Revolution  called  into  existence  a 
new  state,  a  state  inheriting  the  language  and  tra- 
ditions of  England,  but  taking  in  some  respects  a 
line  of  its  own,  in  which  it  departed  from  the  prece- 
dents not  only  of  England  but  of  Europe.  This 
state  was  at  the  time  not  large  in  population,  though 
it  was  very  large  in  territory,  and  there  were  many 
chances  that  it  would  dissolve  again  and  never  grow 


172  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

to  be  very  powerful.  But  it  has  not  dissolved;  it 
has  advanced  steadily,  and  is  now,  as  I  have  said, 
superior  not  only  in  territory  but  in  population  also 
to  every  European  state  except  Russia.  Now  it  is  by 
this  result  that  I  estimate  the  historic  importance  of 
the  Revolution,  since  it  is  with  the  rise  and  develop- 
ment of  states  that  history  deals. 

I  have  called  attention  to  a  series  of  events,  the 
Spanish  Armada,  the  colonisation  of  Virginia  and 
New  England,  the  growth  of  the  English  navy  and 
trade,  Cromwell's  attack  on  Spain,  the  naval  wars 
with  Holland,  the  colonial  expansion  of  France  and 
decline  of  Holland,  the  maritime  supremacy  of 
England  from  the  Peace  of  Utrecht,  the  duel  of 
England  and  France  for  the  New  World.  I  have 
shown  that  these  events  taken  together  make  up  the 
exipansion  of  England,  that  during  the  seventeenth 
century  this  development  is  necessarily  somewhat 
hidden  behind  the  domestic  struggle  of  the  nation 
with  the  Stuart  kings,  but  that  in  the  eighteenth 
century  it  ought  to  be  brought  into  the  foreground  of 
history.  Now  in  this  series  the  next  event  is  the 
Schism,  the  American  Revolution,  and  the  historic 
magnitude  of  this  event  is  as  much  above  that  of 
most  earlier  events  in  our  history  as  Greater  Britain  is 
greater  than  England.  For  its  magnitude  is  not 
to  be  estimated  by  inquiring  whether  Howe  and 
Cornwallis  were  great  generals,  or  whether  Wash- 
ington was  or  was  not  a  man  of  genius  !  And  in 
universal  history  it  is  scarcely  less  great  than  in 
the  history  of  England.      The  foundation  in   new 


Vlil  SCHISM  IN  GKEATEK  BKITAIN  173 

territory  of  a  state  of  fifty  millions  of  men,  which 
before  many  years  will  be  a  hundred  millions, — this 
by  itself  is  far  above  the  level  of  all  previous  history. 
No  such  event  had  occurred  before  in  full  daylight 
either  in  the  New  World  or  in  the  Old.  Such  a 
state  has  ten  times  the  population  that  England  had 
at  the  Ke volution  of  1688,  and  twice  the  population 
that  France  had  at  the  Revolution  of  1789.  This 
fact,  if  it  stood  by  itself,  would  be  enough  to  show 
that  time  has  brought  us  into  a  period  of  greater 
magnitudes  and  higher  numbers  than  past  history 
has  dealt  with.  But  it  does  not  stand  by  itself. 
Bigness  no  doubt  is  not  necessarily  greatness,  and  in 
Asiatic  history,  though  not  in  European,  much  larger 
figures  may  be  met  with,  for  India  and  China  have  a 
population  not  less  than  five  times  as  large  as  the 
United  States.  But  the  peculiarity  of  this  state  lies 
as  much  in  its  quality  as  in  its  magnitude.  Hitherto, 
unless  we  except  the  imperfectly  known  case  of  China, 
all  states  that  have  been  of  very  large  extent  have 
been  of  low  organisation. 

It  had  been  the  boast  of  England  to  show  how 
liberty,  such  as  had  been  known  in  the  city-states  of 
Greece  and  Italy,  might  be  maintained  in  a  nation- 
state  of  the  modern  type.  Now  the  new  state 
founded  in  America  inherited  this  discovery,  both 
the  theory  and  the  practice  of  it,  and  has  devised  all 
the  modifications  that  were  necessary  for  the  applica- 
tion of  it  to  a  still  larger  territory.  The  consequence 
is  that  this  new  large  state,  while  in  extent  it  belongs 
to  the  same  class  as  India  or  Eussia,  is  in  point  of 


174  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

liberty  at  the  opposite  end  of  the  scale.  Hegel 
described  the  history  of  the  world  as  a  gradual 
development  of  human  free-will.  According  to  him 
there  are  some  states  in  which  only  one  man  is  free, 
others  in  which  a  few  are  free,  others  in  which  many. 
Now  if  we  were  to  arrange  states  in  a  series  according 
to  the  extension  of  the  spirit  of  freedom,  we  should 
put  most  of  the  very  large  states  of  the  world  at  the 
lower  end  of  such  a  scale.  But  no  one  would  hesitate 
to  put  this  very  large  state,  the  United  States,  at  the 
opposite  end,  as  being  beyond  question  the  state  in 
which  free-will  is  most  active  and  alive  in  every 
individual. 

Here  is  a  result  which  is  great,  and  not  merely 
big  !  But  to  Englishmen  the  American  phenomenon 
ought  to  be  infinitely  more  interesting  and  important 
than  to  the  rest  of  mankind  because  of  the  unique 
relation  in  which  they  stand  to  it.  There  is  no  other 
example  in  history  of  two  great  states  related  to  each 
other  as  England  and  the  United  States  are  related. 
True,  the  South  American  RepubUcs  have  sprung 
from  Spain,  and  Brazil  from  Portugal,  in  the  same 
way,  but  they  cannot  be  called  great  states ;  and 
besides,  as  I  have  said,  the  South  American  popula- 
tion is  to  a  very  large  extent  of  Indian  blood.  But 
this  great  state,  sprvmg  from  England  and  predomi- 
nantly English  in  blood,  is  not  practically  separated 
from  us,  as  their  former  colonies  are  separated  from 
Spain  and  Portugal,  by  remoteness  of  space ;  but  by 
reason  of  the  immense  expansion  and  ubiquitous 
activity  of  both  nations  is  always  close  to  us,  always 


nil  SCHISM  IN  GKEATER  BRITAIN  175 

in  contact  with  us,  exerts  a  strong  influence  upon  us 
by  the  strange  career  it  runs  and  the  novel  experi- 
ments it  tries,  while  at  the  same  time  it  receives  from 
us  a  great  influence  in  many  ways,  but  principally 
through  our  literature. 

There  is  no  topic  so  pregnant  as  this  of  the  mutual 
influence  of  the  branches  of  the  English  race.  The 
whole  future  of  the  planet  depends  upon  it.  But  if 
so,  what  are  we  to  think  of  the  treatment  which  the 
American  Revolution  receives  from  our  historians? 
One  would  think  that  the  importance  of  the  event 
in  English  history  and  in  universal  history  were  no 
concern  of  theirs.  They  despatch  it  very  summarily. 
They  treat  us  to  a  constitutional  discussion  of  the 
right  of  taxation  and  to  some  glowing  descriptions  of 
Chatham's  oratory;  in  due  time  they  describe  the 
war,  apologise  for  our  defeats,  make  the  most  of  our 
successes,  tell  some  anecdotes  of  Franklin,  estimate 
the  merits  of  Washington,  and  then  dismiss  the  whole 
subject,  as  if  it  were  tedious  and  did  not  interest 
them.  A  very  minor  question  in  the  long  Stuart 
controversy  would  occupy  them  longer,  the  adven- 
tures of  Prince  Charles  Edward  would  rouse  their 
imaginations  more,  the  inquiry  who  was  the  author 
of  Junius  would  excite  a  more  eager  curiosity.  Is 
there  not  something  wrong  here  1  Is  it  not  evident 
that  we  have  yet  to  learn  what  history  is ;  that  what 
we  have  hitherto  called  history  is  not  history  at  all, 
but  ought  to  be  called  by  some  other  name,  perhaps 
biography,  perhaps  party  politics  1  History,  I  say,  is 
not  constitutional  laAv,  nor  parliamentary  tongue-fence, 


176  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

nor  biography  of  great  men,  nor  even  moral  philo- 
sophy. It  deals  with  states,  it  investigates  their  rise 
and  development  and  mutual  influence,  the  causes 
which  promote  their  prosperity  or  bring  about  their 
decay. 

But  in  these  lectures  on  the  Expansion  of  England 
the  American  Revolution  is  to  be  discussed  in  one 
aspect  only,  viz.  as  the  end  of  our  first  experiment  in 
expansion.  Like  a  bubble.  Greater  Britain  expanded 
rapidly  and  then  burst.  It  has  since  been  expanding 
again.     Can  we  avoid  the  obvious  inference  ? 

It  is  constantly  repeated,  as  if  it  were  beyond  dis- 
pute, that  the  secession  of  the  American  colonies  was 
an  inevitable  result  of  the  natural  law  which  prompts 
every  colony,  when  it  is  ripe,  to  set  up  for  itself,  and 
that  therefore  the  statesmen  of  George  Ill's  time 
who  are  responsible  for  it — George  Grenville,  Charles 
Townshend,  and  Lord  North— can  be  charged  with 
nothing  more  serious  than  hastening  perhaps  by  a 
little  an  unavoidable  catastrophe.  Noav  on  this  head 
I  need  add  but  little  to  what  I  have  said  already.  So 
long  as  a  colony  is  regarded  as  a  mere  estate  out  of 
which  the  mother-coimtry  is  to  make  a  pecuniary 
profit,  of  course  its  allegiance  is  highly  precarious,  of 
course  it  will  escape  as  soon  as  it  can.  In  truth  the 
illustration  drawn  from  the  grown-up  son  is  not  half 
strong  enough  for  such  a  case.  On  that  system  a 
colony  is  not  treated  as  a  child  but  as  a  slave,  and 
it  will  emancipate  itself  from  such  a  yoke,  not  with 
gratitude  as  a  grown-up  son  may  do,  but  with  in- 
dignation that  it  should  ever,  even  in  its  weakness, 


VIII  SCHISM  IN  GREATER  BRITAIN  177 

have  been  treated  so.  The  secession  of  the  American 
colonies  therefore  was  perhaps  inevitable,  but  only 
because,  and  so  far  as,  they  were  held  under  the  old 
colonial  system. 

I  have  explained  how  difficult  it  was  at  that  time 
to  substitute  a  better  system,  but  a  better  system 
exists,  a  better  system  is  practicable  now.  There  is 
now  no  reason  why  a  colony  after  a  certain  time 
should  desire  emancipation ;  nay,  even  in  that  age  the 
practice  of  our  Colonial  Government  was  much  better 
than  the  theory.  We  are  not  to  suppose  that  the' 
colonies  rebelled  against  English  rule  simply  as  such. 
The  Government  against  which  they  rebelled  was 
that  of  George  III.  in  his  first  twenty  years;  now 
that  period  stands  marked  in  our  domestic  annals 
too  for  the  narrow-mindedness  and  pervefseness  of 
Government.  There  was  discontent  at  home  as  well 
as  in  the  colonies.  Mansfield  on  the  one  side  of 
politics  and  Grenville  on  the  other  had  just  at  that 
time  given  an  interpretation  of  our  liberties  which 
deprived  them  of  all  reality.  It  was  this  new-fangled 
system,  not  the  ordinary  system  of  English  govern- 
ment, which,  excited  discontent  everywhere  alike, 
which  provoked  the  Wilkes  agitation  in  England  at 
the  same  time  as  the  colonial  agitation  beyond  the 
Atlantic.  But  the  malecontents  in  England  had  no 
such  simple  remedy  as  lay  at  the  command  of  the 
malecontents  of  Massachusetts  and  Virginia.  They 
could  not  repudiate  the  Government  which  roused 
their  sense  of  injury. 

It  was  not  then  simply  because  they  were  colonies 
N 


178  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

that  our  colonies  rebelled.  It  was  because  they  were 
•  colonies  under  the  old  colonial  system,  and  at  a  moment 
when  that  system  itself  was  administered  in  an  unusu- 
ally narrow-minded  and  pedantic  way.  But  I  observe 
next  that  any  general  inference  drawn  from  the  con- 
duct of  these  colonies  is  open  to  objection,  because 
they  were  not  normal  but  very  peculiar  colonies. 

The  modern  idea  of  a  colony  is  that  it  is  a  com- 
munity formed  by  the  overflow  of  another  community. 
Overcrowding  and  poverty  in  one  country  causes,  we 
think,  emigration  to  another  country  which  is  emptier 
and  richer.  I  have  explained  that  this  was  not  the 
nature  of  our  American  colonies.  England^  on  the 
one  hand  was  then  not  overcrowded.  On  the  other 
hand  the  eastern  coast  of  North  America,  where  the 
colonies  were  settled,  was  not  specially  attractive  by 
its  wealth.  It  was  no  Eldorado,  no  Potosi,  and  in 
the  northern  part  it  was  even  poor.  Why  then  did 
colonists  settle  in  it?  They  had  one  predominant 
motive,  and  it  was  the  same  which  Moses  alleged  to 
Pharaoh  for  the  Exodus  of  the  Israelites.  "We 
must  go  seven  days'  journey  into  the  wilderness  to 
offer  a  sacrifice  unto  the  Lord  our  God."  Eeligion 
impelled  them.  They  wished  to  live  on  beliefs 
and  to  practise  rites  which  were  not  tolerated  in 
England.  This  indeed  was  not  the  case  everywhere 
alike.  Virginia  of  course  was  Anglican.  But  the 
New  England  colonies  were  Puritan,  Pennsylvania 
was  Quaker,  Maryland  was  Catholic,  while  of  South 

1  Compare  the   chapter  in  Adam  Smith :   Of  the  motives  for 
establishing  new  colonies. 


VIII  SCHISM  IN  GREATER  BRITAIN  179 

Carolina  we  read  ^  that  "  the  Churchmen  were  not  a 
third  part  of  the  inhabitants,"  and  that  "many 
various  opinions  had  been  taught  by  a  multitude  of 
teachers  and  expounders  of  all  sorts  and  persuasions." 
Thus  the  old  emigration  was  a  real  exodus — that  is,  it 
was  a  religious  emigration.  Now  this  makes  all  the 
difference.  The  emigrant  who  goes  out  merely  to 
make  his  fortune  may  possibly  in  time  forget  his 
native  land ;  but  he  is  not  likely  to  do  so ;  absence 
endears  it  to  him,  distance  idealises  it ;  he  desires  to 
return  to  it  when  his  money  is  made,  he  would  gladly 
be  buried  in  it.  There  is  scarcely  more  than  one 
thing  that  can  break  this  spell,  and  that  is  religion. 
Eeligion  indeed  may  turn  emigration  into  exodus. 
Those  who  leave  Troy  carrying  their  gods  with  them 
can  resist  no  doubt  the  yearning  that  draws  them 
back ;  they  can  build  with  confidence  their  Lavinium 
or  their  Alba,  or  even  their  Rome,  in  the  new  territory 
imhallowed  before.  For  I  always  hold  that  religion 
is  the  great  state-building  principle;  these  colonists 
could  create  a  new  state  because  they  were  already  a 
church,  since  the  church,  so  at  least  I  hold,  is  the 
soul  of  the  state ;  where  there  is  a  church  a  state 
grows  up  in  time ;  but  if  you  find  a  state  which  is 
not  also  in  some  sense  a  church,  you  find  a  state 
which  is  not  long  for  this  world. 

Now  in  this  respect  the  American  colonies  were 

very  peculiar.     How  is  it  possible  to  draw  from  their 

history  any  conclusion  about  colonies  in  general  1    In 

particular  how  can  you  argue  from  their  case  to  the 

»  HUdretb,  u.  p.  232. 


180  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect, 

case  of  our  present  colonies  which  have  grown  up 
since  1  In  those  colonies  there  was  from  the  outset  a 
spirit  driving  them  to  separation  from  England,  a 
principle  attracting  them  and  conglobing  them  into  a 
new  union  among  themselves,  I  have  remarked  how 
early  this  spirit  showed  itself  in  the  New  England 
colonies.  No  doubt  it  was  not  present  in  all.  It 
was  not  present  in  Virginia,  but  Avhen  the  colonial 
discontents,  heated  by  the  pedantry  of  Grenville  and 
Lord  North,  burst  into  a  flame,  then  was  the  moment 
when  Virginia  went  over  to  New  England,  and  the 
spirit  of  the  Pilgrim  Fathers  found  the  power  to  turn 
offended  colonists  into  a  new  nation. 

But  what  is  to  be  found  similar  to  this  in  our 
present  colonies  1  They  have  not  sprung  out  of  any 
religious  exodus.  Their  founders  carried  no  gods 
with  them.  On  the  contrary  they  go  out  into  the 
wilderness  of  mere  materialism,  into  territories  where 
as  yet  there  is  nothing  consecrated,  nothing  ideal. 
Where  can  their  gods  be  but  at  home  ?  If  they  in 
such  circumstances  can  find  within  them  the  courage 
to  stand  out  as  state-builders, — if  they  can  have  the 
heart  to  sever  themselves  from  English  history,  from 
all  traditions  and  memories  of  the  island  where  their 
fathers  lived  for  a  thousand  years, — it  will  indeed  be 
necessary  to  think  that  England  is  a  name  which 
possesses  sadly  little  attractive  power. 

I  think  then  that  we  mistake  the  moral  of  the 
American  Revolution,  when  we  infer  from  it  that  all 
colonies — and  not  merely  colonies  of  religious  refugees 
under  a  bad  colonial  system — fall  off  from  the  tree  as 


VIII  SCHISM  IN  GREATER  BRITAIN  181 

soon  as  they  ripen.  And  in  like  manner  perhaps  we 
draw  a  wrong  inference,  and  omit  to  draw  the  right 
inference,  from  the  prosperity  which  the  United 
States  have  enjoyed  since  the  secession.  I  suppose 
there  has  never  been  in  any  community  so  much 
happiness,  or  happiness  of  a  kind  so  little  demoralis- 
ing, as  in  the  United  States.  But  the  causes  of  this 
happiness  are  not  political.  They  lie  rooted  much 
deeper  than  the  political  institutions  of  the  country. 
If  a  philosopher  were  asked  for  a  recipe  to  produce 
the  greatest  amount  of  pure  happiness  in  a  community 
he  would  say.  Take  a  number  of  men  whose  char- 
acters have  been  formed  during  many  generations  by 
rational  liberty,  serious  religion,  and  strenuous  labour. 
Place  these  men  in  a  wide  territory,  where  no  painful 
pressure  shall  reach  them,  and  where  prosperity  shall 
be  within  the  reach  of  alL  Adversity  gives  wisdom 
and  strength,  but  with  pain;  prosperity  gives  pleasure, 
but  relaxes  the  character.  Adversity  followed  after  a 
time  by  prosperity, — this  is  the  recipe  for  healthy 
happiness,  for  it  gives  pleasure  without  speedily 
relaxing  energy.  And  it  is  a  better  recipe  still  if  the 
prosperity  at  last  given  shall  not  be  given  too  easily 
and  unconditionally.  Now  these  are  the  conditions 
which  have  produced  American  happiness.  Characters 
formed  in  a  temperate  zone,  by  Teutonic  liberty  and 
Protestant  religion ;  prosperity  conferred  freely  but 
in  measure,  and  on  the  condition  not  only  of  labour 
but  of  the  use  of  intelligence  and  ingenuity. 

This  recipe  will  produce  happiness,  but  only  for  a 
time,   only  as  long  as   the  population  bears  a  low 


182  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

proportion  to  the  extent  of  territory.     For  a  long 
time  it  was  supposed  that  America  had  some  magic 
secret  by  which  she  avoided  all  the  evils  of  Europe. 
The  secret  was  simple ;  prosperous  conditions  of  life 
and  strong  characters.     Of  late  years  the  Americans 
themselves  have  awakened  from  the  dream  that  their 
country  is  never  to  be  soiled  with  the  crimes  and 
follies  of  Europe.     They  have  no  enemies,  but  yet 
they  have  had  a  war  on  a  scale  as  gigantic  as  their 
territory,  which  Mr.  Wells  reckons  to  have  cost  in 
four  years  a  million  lives  and  nearly  two  thousand 
millions  of  pounds  sterling ;  they  have  not  kings,  and 
yet  we  know  that  they  have  had  regicide.     Neverthe- 
less the  reputation  and  the  greatness  of  the  United 
States  stand  now  perhaps  higher  than  ever.     But 
insensibly  their  pretensions  have  changed  their  char- 
acter.     Now  it  is  said  that  no  state  was  ever  so 
powerful,  that  it  is  or  will  be  the  dominating  state  of 
the  world ;  in  other  words  it  is  classed  among  other 
states,  but  at  the  head  of  them.     Its  pretension  used 
to  be  wholly  different.     It  used  to  claim  to  be  unique 
in  kind;   to  be  a  visible   proof  that  the  states  of 
Europe  with  their  vaunts  of  power,  their  haughty 
Governments,  their  wars  and  their  debts,  were  on  the 
wrong  road  altogether;   that  happiness  and  virtue 
hold  a  more  modest  path  ;  and  that  the  best  lot  for  a 
state  is  not  to  be  great  in  history,  but  rather  to  have 
no  history  at  all. 

American  happiness  then  is  in  no  great  degree 
the  consequence  of  secession.  But  does  she  owe 
to  secession  her  immense  greatness  1 


vni  SCHISM  IN  GREATER  BRITAIN  183 

When  we  look  back  over  the  stages  of  her  progress 
we  are  able  easily  to  discover  that  she  has  been 
in  several  points  remarkably  favoured  by  fortune. 
Imagine  for  instance  that  the  original  colonies,  instead 
of  lying  in  a  compact  group  along  the  coast,  had  been 
scattered  over  the  Continent,  and  had  been  separated 
from  one  another  by  other  settlements  belonging  to 
other  European  states.  Such  a  difference  might  have 
made  the  growth  of  the  Union  impossible.  Imagine 
again  that  the  French  colony  of  Louisiana,  instead 
of  failing  miserably,  had  advanced  steadily  in  the 
hundred  years  between  its  foundation  and  the  Ameri- 
can Revolution.  This  colony  embraced  the  valley  of 
the  Mississippi.  Had  it  been  successful  it  might 
easily  have  grown  into  a  great  French  state,  held 
together  through  its  whole  length  by  its  immense 
river.  Or  again  suppose  it  had  passed  into  the 
hands  of  England  !  It  was  Napoleon  who,  by  selling 
Louisiana  to  the  United  States,  made  it  possible  for 
the  Union  to  develop  into  the  gigantic  Power  we  see. 

Still  it  is  evident  that  the  United  States  has  found 
the  solution  of  that  great  problem  of  expansion  on  a 
vast  scale,  which  we  have  seen  all  the  five  Western 
nations  of  Europe  in  succession  failing  to  solve.  We 
saw  them  starting  with  the  notion  of  an  indefinite 
extension  of  the  state,  but  we  saw  them  almost  in  a^ 
moment  lose  their  hold  of  this  conception  and  take 
up  instead  an  extremely  opposite  conception,  out  of 
which  grew  the  old  colonial  system.  We  saw  them 
treat  their  colonies  as  public  estates,  of  which  the 
profits  were  to  be  secured  to  the  population  of  the 


184  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LEOT. 

mother-country.  We  saw  at  the  same  time  that  this 
system  could  never  be  represented  as  anything  but  a 
makeshift,  so  that  under  it  there  always  lurked  the 
despair  of  any  permanent  possession  of  colonies.  We 
saw,  from  this  cause  and  from  others,  Empire  after 
Empire  in  the  NeAv  World  dissolve.  Our  own  first 
Empire  was  among  these.  But  we  have  since  come 
into  possession  of  a  new  one.  In  the  management  of 
this  we  have  been  careful  enough  to  avoid  the  old 
error.  The  old  colonial  system  is  gone.  But  in 
place  of  it  no  clear  and  reasoned  system  has  been 
adopted.  The  wrong  theory  is  given  up,  but  what  is 
the  right  theory  ?  There  is  only  one  alternative.  If 
the  colonies  are  not,  in  the  old  phrase,  possessions  of 
England,  then  they  must  be  a  part  of  England ;  and 
we  must  adopt  this  view  in  earnest.  We  must  cease 
altogether  to  say  that  England  is  an  island  ofi"  the 
north-western  coast  of  Europe,  that  it  has  an  area  of 
120,000  square  miles  and  a  population  of  thirty  odd 
millions.  We  must  cease  to  think  that  emigrants, 
when  they  go  to  colonies,  leave  England  or  are  lost 
to  England.  We  must  cease  to  think  that  the  history 
of  England  is  the  history  of  the  Parliament  that  sits  at 
Westminster,  and  that  afi"airs  which  are  not  discussed 
there  cannot  belong  to  English  history.  When  we 
have  accustomed  ourselves  to  contemplate  the  whole 
Empire  together  and  call  it  all  England,  we  shall  see 
that  here  too  is  a  United  States.  Here  too  is  a 
great  homogeneous  people,  one  in  blood,  language, 
religion  and  laws,  but  dispersed  over  a  boundless 
space.     We  shall  see  that,  though  it  is  held  together 


VIII  SCHISM  IN  GREATER  BRITAIN  185 

by  strong  moral  ties,  it  has  little  that  can  be  called  a 
constitution,  no  system  that  seems  capable  of  resisting 
any  severe  shock.  But  if  we  are  disposed  to  doubt 
whether  any  system  can  be  de\dsed  capable  of  holding 
together  communities  so  distant  from  each  other, 
then  is  the  time  to  recollect  the  history  of  the 
United  States  of  America.  For  they  have  such  a 
system.  They  have  solved  this  problem.  They  have 
shown  that  in  the  present  age  of  the  world  political 
unions  may  exist  on  a  vaster  scale  than  was  possible 
in  former  times.  No  doubt  our  problem  has  diffi- 
culties of  its  own,  immense  difficulties.  But  the 
greatest  of  these  difficulties  is  one  which  we  make 
ourselves.  It  is  the  false  preconception  which  we 
bring  to  the  question,  that  the  problem  is  insoluble, 
that  no  such  thing  ever  was  done  or  ever  will  be 
done;  it  is  our  misinterpretation  of  the  American 
Revolution. 

From  that  Revolution  we  infer  that  all  distant 
colonies,  sooner  or  later,  secede  from  the  mother- 
country.  We  ought  to  infer  only  that  they  secede 
when  they  are  held  iinder  the  old  colonial  system. 

We  infer  that  population  overflowing  from  a  country 
into  countries  on  the  other  side  of  an  ocean  must 
needs  break  the  tie  that  binds  them  to  their  original 
home,  acquire  new  interests,  and  make  the  nucleus  of 
a  new  State.  We  ought  to  infer  only  that  refugees, 
driven  across  the  ocean  by  religious  exclusiveness  and 
carrying  with  them  strong  religious  ideas  of  a  peculiar 
type,  may  make  the  nucleus  of  a  new  state.  This 
remark  is  confirmed  in  an  unexpected  manner  by  the 


186  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LBOT.  vill 

history  of  the  secession  of  Southern  and  Central 
America  from  Spain  and  Portugal.  Here,  to  be  sure, 
there  was  Catholicism  on  both  sides  of  the  ocean ;  but 
Gervinus  remarks  that  in  reality  the  religion  of  those 
regions  was  Jesuitism,  and  that  accordingly  the 
suppression  of  the  Jesuits  gave  a  moral  shock  to  the 
population  which  he  reckons  among  the  leading  causes 
of  disruption. 

Lastly,  we  infer  from  the  greatness  of  the  United 
States  since  their  secession  that  the  division  of  states, 
when  they  become  overlargc,  is  expedient.  But  the 
greatness  of  the  United  States  is  the  best  proof  that 
a  state  may  become  immensely  krge  and  yet  prosper. 
The  Union  is  the  great  example  of  a  system  under 
which  an  indefinite  number  of  provinces  is  firmly 
held  together  without  any  of  the  inconveniences 
which  have  been  felt  in  our  Empire.  It  is  therefore 
the  visible  proof  that  those  inconveniences  are  not 
inseparable  from  a  large  Empire,  but  only  from  the 
old  colonial  system. 

But  the  expansion  of  England  has  been  twofold. 
Hitherto  we  have  considered  only  the  expansion  of 
the  English  nation  and  state  together  by  means  of 
colonies.  What  are  we  to  think  of  that  other  and 
much  stranger  expansion  by  which  India  with  its 
vast  population  has  passed  under  the  rule  of  English- 
men? 


SECOND  COUESE 


LECTURE  I 

HISTORY  AND  POLITICS 

Historians  are  sometimes  ridiculed  for  indulging 
in  conjectures  about  what  would  have  followed  in 
history  if  some  one  event  had  fallen  out  diflferently. 
"  So  gloriously  unpractical ! "  we  exclaim.  Now  it  is 
not  for  the  sake  of  practice,  but  for  the  sake  of 
theory,  that  such  conjectures  are  hazarded,  and  I 
think  historians  should  deal  in  them  much  more  than 
they  do.  It  is  an  illusion  to  suppose  that  great 
public  events,  because  they  are  on  a  grander  scale, 
have  something  more  fatally  necessary  about  them 
than  ordinary  private  events ;  and  this  illusion 
enslaves  the  judgment.  To  form  any  opinion  or 
estimate  of  a  great  national  policy  is  impossible  so 
long  as  you  refuse  even  to  imagine  any  other  policy 
pursued.  This  remark  is  especially  applicable  to  an 
event  so  vast  and  complex  as  the  Expansion  of 
England.  Think  for  a  moment,  if  there  had  been  no 
connection  of  England  with  the  New  World !  How 
utterly  different  would  have  been  the  whole  course 


190  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

of  English  history  since  the  reign  of  Queen  Elizabeth  ! 
No  Spanish  Armada  would  have  come  against  us, 
and  there  would  have  been  no  Drake  and  Hawkins  to 
withstand  it.  No  great  English  navy  would  have 
grown  up.  Blake  would  not  have  fought  with  Van 
Tromp  and  De  Ruyter.  The  wars  of  the  Long 
Parliament  and  Charles  II.  with  Holland,  the  war  of 
CromweU  with  Spain,  would  never  have  taken  place. 
The  country  would  not  have  amassed  the  capital 
which  enabled  it  to  withstand  and  at  last  to  humble 
Louis  XIV.  The  great  commercial  corporations 
would  not  have  arisen  to  balance  the  landed  interest 
and  transform  the  policy  of  the  state.  England 
would  not  have  stood  at  the  head  of  all  nations  in 
Queen  Anne's  reign,  and  we  should  have  had  a  wholly 
and  entirely  different  eighteenth  century.  Every- 
thing in  short  would  be  utterly  unlike  what  it  is; 
and  you  may  be  tempted  to  ridicule  the  whole 
speculation  as  unprofitable,  because  infinite. 

But  yet  it  is  the  most  practical  of  all  speculations, 
and  for  this  reason.  All  this  vast  expansion,  all 
these  prodigious  accretions  which  have  gathered 
round  the  original  England  in  three  centuries,  are 
yet  not  so  completely  incorporate  with  England  that 
we  cannot  contemplate  shaking  ourselves  free  from 
them  and  becoming  again  the  plain  England  of  Queen 
Elizabeth.  The  growth  of  our  Empire  may  indeed 
have  been  in  a  certain  sense  natural ;  Greater  Britain, 
compared  to  old  England,  may  seem  but  the  full- 
grown  giant  developed  out  of  the  sturdy  boy;  but 
there  is  this  difference,  that  the  grown  man  does  not 


t  •  HISTOKY  AND  POLITICS  191 

and  cannot  think  of  becoming  a  boy  again,  whereas 
England  both  can  and  does  consider  the  expediency 
of  emancipating  her  colonies  and  abandoning  India. 
We  do  not,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  think  of  Canada  as 
we  think  of  Kent,  nor  of  Nova  Scotia  as  of  Scotland, 
nor  of  New  South  Wales  as  of  Wales,  nor  of  India 
as  of  Ireland.  We  can  most  easily  conceive  them 
separated  from  us,  and,  if  we  chose,  we  could  most 
easily  bring  about  the  separation.  Nay  more,  many 
authorities  actually  recommend  us  to  do  so.  We  are 
forced  then  to  pass  some  judgment  on  the  expansion 
of  England  considered  as  a  whole.  Is  it  a  transient 
development,  like  the  expansion  of  Spain  ?  Was  it 
even  a  mistake  from  the  beginning,  a  product  of  mis- 
directed energy  ?  Nations  can  and  do  make  mistakes. 
They  are  guided  often  by  blind  passion  or  instinct, 
and  there  is  no  reason  in  the  nature  of  things  why 
their  aberrations  should  not  continue  for  ages  and 
lead  them  infinitely  far.  And  thus  it  is  conceivable 
that  England  ought  from  the  beginning  to  have 
resisted  the  temptations  of  the  New  World,  that  she 
ought  to  have  remained  the  self-contained  island  she 
was  in  Shakspeare's  time — "  in  a  great  pool  a  swan's 
nest "  ;  or  at  least  that  it  would  have  been  fortunate 
for  her  to  have  lost  her  Empire  as  France  did,  or 
when  she  lost  her  first  colonial  Empire  not  to  have 
founded  a  new  one. 

But  if  this  be  so,  or  even  if  it  may  be  so,  what  an 
enormous,  intricate,  and  at  the  same  time  what  a 
momentous  problem  is  before  us !  If  we  have  thus 
wandered  from  the  right  path,  or  if  only  we  ought 


192  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

now  to  strike  into  a  wholly  new  path,  how  prodigi- 
ously important  is  the  fact !  How  much  it  siu-passes 
in  importance  all  those  questions  of  home  politics 
which  absorb  our  attention  so  much !  Many  of  us 
elude  this  consideration  by  a  very  confused  argument. 
We  say,  "Let  us  mind  our  own  affairs  and  not 
concern  ourselves  with  remote  countries,  which  are 
beyond  our  comprehension,  and  which  it  was  a  mis- 
fortune for  us  ever  to  become  connected  with."  But 
if  this  really  was  a  misfortune,  if  our  empire  really 
is  so  much  too  large  for  us,  then  the  question  is 
infinitely  more  urgent  and  instant  than  if  it  were 
otherwise.  For  then  we  cannot  too  soon  resolve  to 
free  ourselves  from  an  encumbrance  which  will 
assuredly  entail  disaster  upon  us;  then  we  ought 
to  devote  ourselves  to  the  vast  and  delicate  problem 
of  destroying  our  Empire,  until  it  is  fairly  achieved. 
And  thus  in  any  case  we  have  here  by  far  the  largest 
of  all  political  questions,  for  if  our  Empire  is  capable 
of  further  development,  we  have  the  problem  of 
discovering  what  direction  that  development  should 
take,  and  if  it  is  a  mischievous  encumbrance,  we 
have  the  still  more  anxious  problem  of  getting  rid  of 
it,  and  in  either  case  we  deal  with  territories  so  vast 
and  populations  which  grow  so  rapidly  that  their 
destinies  are  infinitely  important. 

I  say,  this  is  a  political  problem,  but  is  it  not  also 
a  historical  problem?  Yes,  and  the  main  reason 
why  I  have  chosen  this  subject  is  that  it  illustrates 
better  than  any  other  subject  my  view  of  the  con- 
nection between  history  and  politics.     The  ultimate 


I  HISTORY  AND  POLITICS  193 

object  of  all  my  teaching  here  is  to  establish  this 
fundamental  connection,  to  show  that  politics  and 
history  are  only  different  aspects  of  the  same  study. 
There  is  a  vulgar  view  of  politics  which  sinks  them 
into  a  mere  struggle  of  interests  and  parties,  and 
there  is  a  foppish  kind  of  history  which  aims  only 
at  literary  display,  which  produces  delightful  books 
hovering  between  poetry  and  prose.  These  perver- 
sions, according  to  me,  come  from  an  unnatural 
divorce  between  two  subjects  which  belong  to  each 
other.  Politics  are  vulgar  when  they  are  not 
liberalised  by  history,  and  history  fades  into  mere 
literature  when  it  loses  sight  of  its  relation  to  practical 
politics.  In  order  to  show  this  clearly,  it  has  seemed 
to  me  a  good  plan  to  select  a  topic  which  belongs 
most  evidently  to  history  and  to  politics  at  once. 
Such  a  topic  pre-eminently  is  Greater  Britain.  What 
can  be  more  plainly  political  than  the  questions 
What  ought  to  be  done  with  India  ?  What  ought  to 
be  done  with  our  Colonies  1  But  they  are  questions 
which  need  the  aid  of  history.  We  cannot  delude 
ourselves  here,  as  we  do  in  home  questions  of  fran- 
chise or  taxation,  so  as  to  fancy  that  common  sense 
or  common  morality  will  suffice  to  lead  us  to  a  true 
opinion.  We  cannot  suppose  ourselves  able  to  form 
a  judgment,  for  example,  about  Indian  affairs  without 
some  special  study^  because  we  cannot  help  seeing 
that  the  races  of  India  are  far  removed  from  ourselves 
in  all  physical,  intellectual,  and  moral  conditions. 
Here  then  we  see  how  politics  merge  into  history. 
But  I  am  even  more  anxious  to  show  you  by  this 
o 


194  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LEOT. 

example    how   history  merges    into    politics.      The 
foundation  of  this  Empire  of  ours  is  a  comparatively 
modern   event.      If   we   leave   out   of   account   the 
colonies  we  have  lost  and  think  only  of  the  Empire 
we  still  possess,  we  think  of  an  Empire  which  was 
founded  almost  entirely  in  the  reigns  of  George  II.  . 
and    George   III.     Now   this   is   the   period    which 
students  avoid  as  being  too  modern  for  study ;  this 
is  the  period  which  classic  historians  neglect,  and 
which  accordingly  passes  in  the  popular  mind  for  an 
uneventful  period  of  uniform  prosperity  and  civilis- 
ation.    I   have   complained   that  our   historians  all 
grow   languid   as   they   approach   this   period,  that 
their   descriptions   of    it  are    featureless,    and   that 
accordingly   they   lead    their    readers   to    think    of 
English  history  as  leading  up  to  nothing,  as  a  story 
without  a  moral,  or  as  like  the  Heart  of  Midlothian, 
of  which  the  whole  last  volume  is  dull  and  superfluous. 
You  see  then  how  I  think  this  evil  may  be  cured.     I 
show  you  mighty  events   in   the   future,  events  of 
which,  as  future,  we  know  as  yet  nothing  but  that 
they  must   come,  and   that  they  must  be   mighty. 
These  events  are  some  further  development  in  the 
relation  of  England  to  her  colonies  and  also  in  her 
relation  to  India.     Some  further  development,  I  say, 
for  evidently  the  present  phase  is  not  definitive  ;  but 
what  the  development  will  be  we  cannot  yet  know. 
Will  there  be  a  great  disruption  ?    Will  Canada  and 
Australia  become   independent   States?      Shall    we 
abandon  India,  and  will  some  native  Government  at 
present  almost  inconceivable  take  the  place  of  the 


I  HISTOKY  AND  POLITICS  195 

Viceroy  and  his  Council  ?  Or  will  the  opposite  of  all 
this  happen  1  Will  Greater  Britain  rise  to  a  higher 
form  of  organisation  1  Will  the  English  race,  which 
is  divided  by  so  many  oceans,  making  a  full  use  of 
modern  scientific  inventions,  devise  some  organisation 
like  that  of  the  United  States,  under  which  full 
liberty  and  solid  union  may  be  reconciled  with 
unbounded  territorial  extension?  And,  secondly, 
shall  we  succeed  in  solving  a  still  harder  problem? 
Shall  we  discover  some  satisfactory  way  of  governing 
India,  some  modus  vivendi  for  two  such  extreme 
opposites  as  a  ruling  race  of  Englishmen  in  a  country 
which  they  cannot  colonise,  and  a  vast  population 
of  Asiatics  with  immemorial  Asiatic  traditions  and 
ways  of  life  ?  We  do  not  know,  I  say,  how  these 
problems  will  be  solved,  but  we  may  be  certain  that 
they  will  be  solved  somehow,  and  we  may  be  certain 
from  the  nature  of  the  problems  that  the  solution  of 
them  will  be  infinitely  momentous.  This  then  is 
the  goal  towards  which  England  is  travelling.  We 
are  not  then  to  think,  as  most  historians  seem  to  do, 
that  all  development  has  ceased  in  English  history, 
and  that  we  have  arrived  at  a  permanent  condition 
of  security  and  prosperity.  Not  at  all ;  the  move- 
ment may  be  less  perceptible  because  it  is  on  a  much 
larger  scale;  but  the  changes  and  the  struggles 
when  they  come — and  they  will  come — will  be  on  a 
larger  scale  also.  And  when  the  crisis  arrives,  it 
will  throw  a  wonderful  light  back  upon  our  past 
history.  All  that  amazing  expansion  which  has 
taken  place  since  the  reign  of  George  II.,  and  which 


196  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

we  read  of  with  a  kind  of  bewildered  astonishment, 
will  begin  then  to  impress  us  differently.  At  present 
when  we  look  at  the  boundless  extent  of  Canada  and 
Australia  given  up  to  our  race,  we  are  astonished, 
but  form  no  definite  opinion.  When  we  read  of  the 
conquest  of  India,  two  hundred  millions  of  Asiatics 
conquered  by  an  English  trading  company,  we  are 
astonished  and  admire,  but  we  form  no  definite 
opinion.  All  seems  so  strange  and  anomalous  that 
it  almost  ceases  to  be  interesting.  We  do  not  know 
how  to  judge  of  it  nor  what  to  think  of  it.  It  will 
be  otherwise  then.  Time  will  reveal  what  was  really 
solid  in  all  this  success,  and  what  was  not  so.  We 
shall  know  what  to  think  of  that  great  struggle  of 
the  eighteenth  century  for  the  possession  of  the  New 
World,  when  the  event  has  shown,  either  that  a 
great  and  solid  World-State  has  been  produced,  or 
that  an  ephemeral  trade-empire,  like  that  of  old 
Spain,  rose  to  fall  again;  either  that  a  solid  union 
between  the  West  and  East,  fruitful  in  the  greatest 
and  profoundest  results,  was  effected  in  India,  or 
that  Clive  and  Hastings  set  on  foot  a  monstrous 
enterprise  which,  after  a  century  of  apparent  success, 
ended  in  failure. 

This  lesson  time  will  teach  to  all  alike.  But 
history  ought  surely  in  some  degree,  if  it  is  worth 
anything,  to  anticipate  the  lessons  of  time.  We 
shall  all  no  doubt  be  wise  after  the  event ;  we  study 
history  that  we  may  be  wise  before  the  event.  Why 
should  we  not  now  form  an  opinion  about  the  destiny 
of   our  colonies  and  of  our  Indian  Empire?    That 


I  HISTOKY  AND  POLITICS  197 

destiny,  we  may  be  sure,  will  not  be  decreed 
arbitrarily.  It  will  be  the  result  of  the  working 
of  those  laws  which  it  is  the  object  of  political 
science  to  discover.  When  the  event  takes  place, 
this  will  be  visible  enough ;  all  will  see  more  or 
less  clearly  that  what  has  happened  could  not  but 
happen.  But  if  so,  the  students  of  political  science 
ought  to  be  able  to  foresee,  at  least  in  outline,  the 
event  while  it  is  still  future. 

Now,  do  not  these  considerations  set  the  more 
recent  history  of  England  in  a  new  light?  I  have 
shown  you  England  in  the  latter  part  of  the  sixteenth 
century  entering  upon  a  wholly  new  path.  I  have 
traced  the  stages  of  its  progress  in  this  path  through 
the  seventeenth  century  and  the  prodigious  results 
which  followed  in  the  eighteenth.  I  have  pointed 
out  that  we  are  still  in  a  state  of  things  which  is 
evidently  provisional,  of  which  some  great  modifica- 
tion is  evidently  at  hand.  It  follows  from  all  this 
that  the  modern  part  of  English  history  presents  to 
us  a  great  problem,  one  of  the  greatest  problems,  in 
political  science.  And  thus  I  show  you  history 
merging  in  politics.  I  show  you  the  reigns  of  George 
11.  and  George  III.  not  as  a  mere  bygone  period, 
whose  quaint  manners  and  fashions  it  is  a  delightful 
amusement  to  revive  with  the  imagination,  but  as  a 
storehouse  of  the  materials  by  which  we  are  to  solve 
the  greatest  and  most  urgent  of  all  political  problems. 
In  order  to  understand  what  is  to  become  of  our 
Empire  we  must  study  its  nature,  the  causes  which 
support  it,  the  roots  by  which  its  Life  is  fed  ;   and  to 


198  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LECT. 

study  its  nature  is  to  study  its  history,  and  especially 
the  history  of  its  beginning. 

We  have  been  told  for  a  long  time  past  by  fashion- 
able writers  that  history  has  made  itself  too  solemn 
and  pompous,  that  it  ought  to  deal  in  minute,  familiar, 
vivid  details ;  in  fact  that  it  ought  to  be  written  just 
in  the  style  of  a  novel.     I  will  pause  once  more  to 
tell  you  what  I  think  of  this  view,  which  has  been 
of  late  so  prevalent.     I  do  not  deny  the  criticism  on 
which  it   is   founded.     I   fully  admit  that  history 
should  not  be  solemn  and  pompous,  and  I  admit  that 
for  a  long  time  it  was  both.     But  solemnity  is  one 
thing,  and  seriousness  is  quite  another.     This  school 
argue  that  because  history  should   not   be   solemn, 
therefore  it  should  not  be  serious.     They  deny  that 
history  can  establish  any  solid  or  important  truths ; 
they  have  no  conception  that  any  great  discoveries 
can  ever  come  out  of  it.     They  can  only  see  that  it  is 
exquisitely   entertaining   and   delightful  to  call  the 
past  into  life  again,   to  see  our  ancestors   in  their 
costume  as  they  lived,  and  to  surprise  them  in  the 
very  act  of  doing  their  famous  deeds.     I  find  their 
theory  stated  with  the  most  ingenuous  frankness  by 
Thackeray  in  the  opening  to  his  lecture  on  Steele,  a 
passage  which  almost  every  one  has  read,  and  I  fancy 
almost  every  one  has  thought  very  shrewd  and  true. 
He  says,  "  What  do  we  look  for  in  studying  the 
history  of  a  past  agel     Is  it  to  learn  the  political 
transactions  and   characters   of    the   leading    public 
men  1  is  it  to  make  ourselves  acquainted  with  the  life 
and  being  of  the  time?     If   we   set  out   with   the 


t  HISTORY  AND  POLITICS  199 

former  grave  pui'pose,  where  is  the  truth,  and  who 
believes  that  he  has  it  entire  1 "  And  then  he  goes  on 
to  declare  that  in  his  opinion  the  solemn  statements 
which  we  find  in  books  of  history  about  public  affairs 
are  all  nonsense,  and  would  not  bear  any  sceptical 
examination.  He  refers  by  way  of  example  to 
Swift's  Conduct  of  the  Allies  and  Coxe's  Life  of 
Marllorough,  and  you  see  that  it  is  from  works  of 
that  extremely  old-fashioned  cast  that  he  has  formed 
his  idea  of  what  history  is.  But  now,  political 
history  being  all  nonsense,  what  are  we  to  substitute 
for  it '( 

Thackeray  tells  us  that  we  are  "  to  make  ourselves 
acquainted  with  the  life  and  being  of  the  time." 
What  does  this  mean  1  He  goes  on  to  explain.  "  As 
we  read  in  these  dehghtful  volumes  of  the  Taller 
and  Spectator,  the  past  age  returns,  the  England  of 
our  ancestors  is  revivified.  The  Maypole  rises  in  the 
Strand  again  in  London,  the  churches  are  thronged 
with  daily  worshippers ;  the  beaux  are  gathering  in 
the  cofifee-houses,  the  gentry  are  going  to  the  drawing- 
room,  the  ladies  are  thronging  to  the  toy-shops,  the 
chairmen  are  jostling  in  the  streets,  the  footmen  are 
running  with  links  before  the  chariots  or  fighting 
round  the  theatre  doors.  I  say  the  fiction  carries  a 
greater  amount  of  truth  in  solution  than  the  volume 
which  purports  to  be  all  true.  Out  of  the  fictitious 
book  I  get  the  expression  of  the  life  of  the  time  ; 
of  the  manners,  of  the  movement,  the  dress,  the 
pleasures,  the  laughter,  the  ridicules  of  society — the 
old  times  live  again  and  I  travel  in  the  old  country 


200  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LEOT. 

of  England.  Can  the  heaviest  historian  do  more  for 
me?" 

That  a  great'  novelist  should  think  thus  is  in 
itself  almost  a  matter  of  course.  The  great  engineer 
Brindley,  being  asked  for  what  purpose  he  supposed 
rivers  to  have  been  created,  answered  without  the 
least  hesitation,  To  feed  canals  !  Thackeray,  being 
asked  why  Queen  Anne  lived  and  the  English  under 
the  Duke  of  Marlborough  fought  the  French,  answers 
candidly,  It  was  that  I  might  write  my  delightful 
novel  of  Esmond.  Of  course  he  thought  so,  but  how 
could  he,  with  his  keen  sense  of  humour,  venture  to 
say  so  ?  You  see,  he  appeals  to  our  scepticism,  He 
does  not  deny  that  history  might  be  important  if 
it  were  true,  but  he  says  it  is  not  true.  He  does 
not  believe  a  word  of  it. 

Well!  if  so,  Avhat  should  we  do?  Must  we  take 
the  course  he  points  out  to  us?  Must  we  give  up 
history  as  a  serious  study  but  keep  it  as  a  delightful 
amusement,  turn  away  from  European  wars  and 
watch  the  ladies  thronging  to  the  toy-shops,  cease 
studying  what  sort  of  government  our  ancestors  had 
and  inquire  rather  what  they  had  for  dinner  1  I  tell 
you  there  is  another  and  a  much  better  course,  which 
leads  in  quite  the  opposite  direction.  If  history  for  a 
long  time  has  been,  as  it  has  been,  untrue  and  un- 
satisfactory, correct  it,  amend  it.  Make  it  true  and 
trustworthy.  There  is  no  reason  in  the  world  why 
this  should  not  be  done,  or  rather  it  has  been  done 
already  for  the  greater  part  of  history,  and  only 
remains  undone  in  those  more  recent  periods  which 


I  HISTORY  AND  POLITICS  201 

students  have  neglected.  It  seems  not  to  be  generally 
known  how  much  the  study  of  history  has  been 
transformed  of  late  years.  Those  charges  of  untrust- 
worthiness,  of  pompous  and  hollow  conventionality, 
which  are  vulgarly  made  against  history,  used  to  be 
well-grounded  once,  but  are  in  the  main  groundless 
now.  History  has  been  in  great  part  rewritten ;  in 
great  part  it  is  now  true,  and  lies  before  science  as  a 
mass  of  materials  out  of  which  a  political  doctrine 
may  be  deduced.  It  is  not  now  pompous  and  solemn, 
but  it  is  thoroughly  serious,  much  more  serious  than 
ever.  Here  then  is  the  alternative  which  lies  before 
you.  Instead  of  ceasing  to  regard  history  seriously, 
aa  Thackeray  advises  you,  regard  it  more  seriously 
than  before.  Instead  of  holding  that  you  cannot 
find  the  truth,  and  therefore  may  as  well  cease  to  seek 
it,  consider  that  the  truth  is  hard  to  find,  and  there- 
fore must  be  sought  all  the  more  diligently,  all  the 
more  laboriously. 

For  observe  that  if  once  we  grant  that  historic 
truth  is  attainable,  and  attainable  it  is,  then  there 
can  be  no  further  dispute  about  its  supreme  im- 
portance. It  deals  with  facts  of  the  largest  and  most 
momentous  kind,  with  the  causes  of  the  decay  and 
growth  of  Empires,  with  war  and  peace,  with  the 
sufferings  or  happiness  of  millions.  It  is  by  this  con- 
sideration that  I  merge  history  in  politics.  I  tell 
you  that  when  you  study  English  history  you  study 
not  the  past  of  England  only,  but  her  future.  It  is 
the  welfare  of  your  country,  it  is  your  whole  interest 
as  citizens,    that   is    in    question   while   you   study 


202  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LECT. 

history.      How  it  is  so  I  illustrate  by  putting  before 
you  this  subject  of  the   Expansion   of   England.     I 
show  you  that  there  is  a  vast  question  ripening  for 
decision,  upon  which  almost  the  whole  future  of  our 
country  depends.     In  magnitude  this  question  far  sur- 
passes all  other  questions  which  you  can  ever  have 
to  discuss  in  political  life.     And  yet  it  is  altogether 
a  historical  question.     The  investigation  of  it  requires 
not  only  some  knowledge,  but  I  may  almost  say  a 
full  knowledge  of  the  modern  history  of   England. 
For,  as  I  have  pointed  out,  England  has  been  entirely 
engaged  for  the  last  three  centuries  in  this  expansion 
into  Greater  Britain.     If  therefore  you  would  discern 
in  outline  the  future  of  Greater  Britain,  you  will  have 
to  master  almost  the  whole  history  of  England  in  the 
last  three  centuries.     Only  enter  upon  these  inquiries, 
only   undertake  to  make  up   your   minds  upon  the 
colonial  question  and  the  Indian  question ;  you  will 
find  that  you  are  led  back  from  question  to  question 
and  from  one  department  of  affairs  to  another,  iintil 
you  discover  that  these  two  questions  bring  the  whole 
modern  history  of  England  in  their  train.     And  not 
only  is  this  one   way  of  grasping  English   history, 
but  it  is  the  best  way.     For  in  history  everything 
depends  upon  turning  narrative  into  problems.     So 
long  as  you  think  of  history  as  a  mere  chronological 
narrative,  so  long  you  are  in  the  old  literary  groove 
which  leads  to  no  trustworthy  knowledge,  but  only 
to  that  pompous  conventional  romancing  of  which 
all  serious  men  are  tired.      Break  the  drowsy  spell 
of  narrative;    ask  yourself  questions;   set  yourself 


T  HISTORY  AND  POLITICS  203 

problems  ;  your  mind  will  at  once  take  up  a  new 
attitude ;  you  will  become  an  investigator ;  you  will 
cease  to  be  solemn  and  begin  to  be  serious.  Now 
modern  English  history  breaks  up  into  two  grand 
problems,  the  problem  of  the  colonies  and  the 
problem  of  India. 

Moreover,  all  those  considerations  which  make  the 
universal  study  of  history  imperative  in  all  countries 
where  there  is  popular  government,  operate  in 
England  far  more  strongly  than  in  any  other 
country.  For  this  immense  expansion  of  our  race 
has  the  effect  of  making  English  politics  most 
bewilderingly  difficult.  I  take  it  that  every  other 
country — France,  Germany,  the  United  States,  every 
country  except  perhaps  Eussia — has  a  simple  problem 
to  solve  compared  with  that  which  is  set  before 
England.  Most  of  those  states  are  compact  and 
solid,  scarcely  less  compact,  though  so  much  larger, 
than  the  city-states  of  antiquity.  They  can  only  be 
attacked  at  home,  and  therefore  their  armies  are  a  kind 
of  citizen  soldiery.  Now,  distant  dependencies  destroy 
this  compactness,  and  make  the  national  interest 
hard  to  discern  and  hard  to  protect  Because  of  our 
scattered  colonies  it  is  easy  for  an  enemy  to  strike  at 
us.  If  we  were  at  war  with  the  United  States,  we 
should  feel  it  in  Canada ;  if  with  Russia,  in  Afghan- 
istan. But  this  external  difficulty  is  less  serious  than 
the  internal  difficulties  which  arise  in  a  scattered 
empire.  How  to  give  a  moral  unity  to  vast  countries 
separated  from  each  other  by  half  the  globe,  even 
when  they  are  inhabited  in  the  main  by  one  nation  ! 


204  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lrct. 

But  even  this  is  not  the  greatest  of  the  anxieties  of 
England.  For  besides  the  colonies,  we  have  India. 
Here  at  least  there  is  no  community  of  race  or 
of  religion.  Here  that  solid  basis  which  is  formed 
by  immigration  and  colonisation  is  almost  entirely 
wanting.  Here  you  have  another  problem  not  less 
vast,  not  less  difficult,  and  much  less  hopeful,  than 
that  of  the  colonies.  Either  problem  by  itself  is  as 
much  as  any  nation  ever  took  in  hand  before.  It 
seems  really  too  much  that  both  should  fall  on  the 
same  nation  at  the  same  time. 

Consider  how  distracting  must  be  the  effect  upon 
the  public  mind  of  these  two  opposite  questions.  The 
colonies  and  India  are  in  opposite  extremes.  What- 
ever political  maxims  are  most  applicable  to  the  one, 
are  most  inapplicable  to  the  other.  In  the  colonies 
everything  is  brand-new.  There  you  have  the  most 
progressive  race  put  in  the  circumstances  most  favour- 
able to  progress.  There  you  have  no  past  and  an 
unbounded  future.  Government  and  institutions 
are  all  ultra-English.  All  is  liberty,  industry,  in- 
vention, innovation,  and  as  yet  tranquillity.  Now  if 
this  alone  were  Greater  Britain,  it  would  be  homo- 
geneous, all  of  a  piece ;  and,  vast  and  boundless  as 
the  territory  is,  we  might  come  to  understand  its 
affairs.  But  there  is  at  the  same  time  another 
Greater  Britain,  surpassing  this  in  population  though 
not  in  territory,  and  it  is  everything  which  this  is 
not.  India  is  all  past  and,  I  may  almost  say,  has  no 
future.  What  it  will  come  to  the  wisest  man  is 
afraid'  to  conjecture,  but  in  the  past  it  opens  vistas 


r  HISTORY  AND  POLITICS  205 

into  a  fabulous  antiquity.  All  the  oldest  religions, 
all  the  oldest  customs,  petrified  as  it  were.  No  form 
of  popular  government  as  yet  possible.  Everything 
which  Europe,  and  still  more  the  New  World,  has 
outlived  still  flourishing  in  full  vigour ;  superstition, 
fatalism,  polygamy,  the  most  primitive  priestcraft,  the 
most  primitive  despotism;  and  threatening  the  northern 
frontier  the  vast  Asiatic  steppe  with  its  Osbegs  and  Tur- 
comans. Thus  the  same  nation  which  reaches  one 
hand  towards  the  future  of  the  globe  and  assumes  the 
position  of  mediator  between  Europe  and  the  New 
World,  stretches  the  other  hand  towards  the  remotest 
past,  becomes  an  Asiatic  conqueror,  and  usurps  the 
succession  of  the  Great  Mogul. 

How  can  the  same  nation  pursue  two  lines  of 
policy  so  radically  different  without  bewilderment,  be 
despotic  in  Asia  and  democratic  in  Australia,  be  in 
the  East  at  once  the  greatest  Mussulman  Power  in 
the  world  and  the  guardian  of  the  property  of 
thousands  of  idol-temples,  and  at  the  same  time  in 
the  West  be  the  foremost  champion  of  free  thought 
and  spiritual  religion,  stand  out  as  a  great  military 
Imperialism  to  resist  the  march  of  Russia  in  Central 
Asia  at  the  same  time  that  it  fills  Queensland  and 
Manitoba  with  free  settlers?  Never  certainly  did 
any  nation,  since  the  world  began,  assume  anything 
like  so  much  responsibility.  Never  did  so  many 
vast  questions  in  all  parts  of  the  globe,  questions 
calling  for  all  sorts  of  special  knowledge  and  special 
training,  depend  upon  the  decision  of  a  single  public. 
It  must  be  confessed  that  this  public  bears  its  respon- 


206  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect.  i 

sibility  lightly  !  It  does  not  even  study  colonial  and 
Indian  questions.  It  does  not  consider  them  in- 
teresting, except  in  those  rare  cases  when  they  come 
to  the  foreground  of  politics.  When  the  fate  of  a 
Ministry  is  concerned  they  are  found  intensely 
interesting,  but  the  public  does  not  consider  them 
interesting  so  long  as  only  the  population  of  India, 
the  destiny  of  a  vast  section  of  the  planet,  and  the 
future  of  the  English  state  itself,  are  concerned.  As 
to  India,  Macaulay  writes  thus  :  "  It  might  have 
been  expected  that  every  Englishman  who  takes  any 
interest  in  any  part  of  history  would  be  anxious  to 
know  how  a  handful  of  his  countrymen,  separated 
from  their  home  by  an  immense  ocean,  subjugated  in 
the  course  of  a  few  years  one  of  the  greatest  empires 
in  the  world.  Yet  unless  we  greatly  err,  this  subject 
is  to  most  readers  not  only  insipid  but  positively 
distasteful." 

The  acquisition  of  India  by  England,  as  part  of 
that  expansion  which  in  the  last  two  centimes  has  so 
profoundly  modified  our  state,  will  be  examined  in 
the  succeeding  lectures. 


LECTURE  II 

THE   INDIAN   EMPIRE 

As  formerly  the  Colonial  Empire,  so  now  the  Indian 
Empire  is  to  be  considered  only  so  far  as  it  illustrates 
the  general  law  of  expansion  which  prevails  in  the 
modern  part  of  English  history.  It  will  be  considered 
not  in  itself,  but  only  in  its  relation  to  our  own 
state.  It  will  be  considered  historically — that  is,  in 
the  causes  which  produced  it ;  but  also  politically — • 
that  is,  in  regard  to  its  value  or  stability. 

From  this  point  of  view  we  shall  not  find  it 
convenient  to  observe  chronological  order.  Our 
acquisition  of  India  was  made  blindl3\  Nothing 
great  that  has  ever  been  done  by  Englishmen  was 
done  so  unintentionally,  so  accidentally,  as  the  conquest 
of  India.  There  has  indeed  been  little  enough  of 
calculation  or  contrivance  in  our  colonisation.  When 
our  first  settlers  went  out  to  Virginia  and  New 
England,  it  was  not  intended  to  lay  the  foundations  of 
a  mighty  republican  state.  But  here  the  event  has 
differed  from  the  design  only  in  degree.     We  did 


208  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

intend  to  establish  a  new  community,  and  we  even 
knew  that  it  would  be  republican  in  its  tendency ; 
what  was  hidden  from  us  was  only  its  immense 
magnitude.  But  in  India  we  meant  one  thing,  and 
did  quite  another.  Our  object  was  trade,  and  in  this 
we  were  not  particularly  successful  War  with  the 
native  states  we  did  not  think  of  at  all  till  a 
hundred  years  after  our  first  settlement,  and  then 
we  thought  only  of  such  war  as  might  support  our 
trade;  after  this  time  again  more  than  half  a  cen- 
tury passed  before  we  thought  of  any  considerable 
territorial  acquisitions;  the  nineteenth  century  had 
almost  begun  before  the  policy  of  acquiring  an 
ascendency  over  the  native  states  was  entered  upon ; 
and  our  present  supreme  position  cannot  be  said  to 
have  been  attained  before  the  Governor-Generalship 
of  Lord  Dalhousie  little  more  than  a  quarter  of  a 
century  ago.  All  along  we  have  been  looking  one 
way  and  moving  another.  In  a  case  like  this  the 
chronological  method  of  study  is  the  worst  that  can  be 
chosen.  If  we  were  to  trace  the  history  of  the  East 
India  Company  from  year  to  year,  carefully  putting 
ourselves  at  the  point  of  view  of  the  Directors,  we 
should  be  doing  all  in  our  power  to  blind  ourselves. 
For  it  has  not  been  the  will  of  the  Directors,  but 
other  forces  overruling  their  will,  forces  against 
which  they  struggled  in  vain,  by  which  the  Indian 
Empire  has  been  brought  into  existence.  For  this 
reason  it  is  almost  necessary,  as  for  other  reasons  it 
is  convenient,  to  begin  at  the  other  end,  and  before 
considering   how   the   Empire   grew   to   its   preseut 


11  THE  INDIAN  EMPIRE  209 

greatness  to  inquire  what  at  the  present  moment  it 
actually  is. 

We  call  this  Empire  a  conquest,  in  order  to  mark 
the  fact  that  it  was  not  acquired  in  any  degree  by 
settlement  or  colonisation,  but  by  a  series  of  wars 
ending  in  cessions  of  territory  by  the  native  Powers 
to  the  East  India  Company.  But  let  us  be  careful 
how  we  take  for  granted  that  it  is  a  conquest  in  any 
more  precise  sense  of  the  word. 

Above  I  criticised  the  term  "possessions  of 
England,"  which  is  so  commonly  applied  to  the 
colonies.  I  asked,  if  by  England  be  meant  the  people 
inhabiting  England  and  by  the  colonies  certain 
English  people  living  beyond  the  sea,  in  what  sense 
can  one  of  these  populations  be  said  to  belong  to  the 
other?  Or  if  by  England  you  mean  the  English 
Government,  which  is  also  ultimately  the  Govern- 
ment of  the  colonies,  Avhy  should  we  speak  of  the 
subjects  of  a  Government  as  its  possession  or  pro- 
perty, unless  indeed  they  became  its  subjects  by 
conquest  1  Now  this  criticism  does  not  directly  apply 
to  India,  because  India  did  come  under  the  Queen's 
government  by  conquest.  India  therefore  may  be 
called  a  possession  of  England  in  a  sense  which  is  not 
applicable  to  the  colonies.  Nevertheless  the  word  con- 
quest, which,  like  most  of  the  vocabulary  of  war,  has 
come  down  to  us  from  primitive  barbaric  times,  may 
easily  be  misunderstood.  We  may  still  ask  in  what 
sense  England  am  be  said  to  possess  India.  What 
we  possess  we  do  vote  in  some  manner  to  our  own 
enjoyment.  If  I  own  land,  I  either  take  the  profits 
? 


^10  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lkct. 

of  the  harvest,  or,  if  I  let  the  land  to  a  farmer,  I  get 
rent  from  it.  And  in  primitive  times  the  conquest 
of  a  country  was  usually  followed  by  possession  in 
some  literal  sense.  Sometimes  the  conquerors  actu- 
ally became  landlords  of  the  conquered  territory  or 
of  part  of  it,  as  in  that  conquest  of  Palestine  which 
we  read  of  in  the  Book  of  Joshua,  or  in  those  Roman 
conquests  where  a  certain  extent  of  confiscated  land 
was  often  granted  out  to  a  number  of  Roman  citizens. 
Now  assuredly  India  is  not  a  conquered  country  in 
this  sense.  England  has  not  seized  lands  in  India, 
and  after  displacing  the  native  proprietors  assigned 
them  to  Englishmen. 

There  is  another  sense  in  which  we  may  conceive 
the  condition  of  a  conquered  country.  We  may 
think  of  it  as  tributary  or  paying  tribute.  Only  we 
must  be  careful  how  we  understand  the  expression. 
If  it  merely  means  that  the  people  pay  a  tax, — in  other 
words,  that  they  meet  the  expense  of  their  own  govern- 
ment or  of  the  army  that  protects  their  frontier, — there 
is  nothing  in  this  peculiar  to  a  conquered  people. 
Almost  every  people  in  some  form  or  other  pays 
the  expense  of  its  own  government.  If  the  word 
"  tributary  "  is  to  be  equivalent  to  "  conquered  "  or 
"  dependent "  it  must  mean  paying  something  over 
and  above  the  expense  of  its  government.  We  have 
an  example  of  such  a  tribute  in  modern  Egypt.  The 
government  of  Egypt  is  in  the  hands  of  a  Khedive 
who  pays  himself  handsomely  out  of  the  pockets  of 
the  people ;  but  Egypt  is  tributary  to  the  Sultan  of 
Turkey, — that  is,  it  pays  to  him  a  sum  which  does  not 


II  THE  INDIAN  EMPIRE  211 

in  any  shape  return  to  the  country,  but  simply  marks 
its  relation  of  dependence  upon  the  Sultan. 

Such  a  tribute  as  this  would  mark  that  the  country 
which  paid  it  was  a  possession  of  the  country  which 
received  it,  because  it  seems  analogous  to  the  rent 
which  a  tenant  farmer  pays  to  the  landowner.  Is 
India  then  tributary  in  this  sense  to  England? 
Certainly  not,  at  least  not  directly  or  avowedly. 
Taxes  are  raised  of  course  in  India,  as  taxes  are 
raised  in  England,  but  India  is  no  more  tributary 
than  England  itself.  The  money  drawn  from  India 
is  spent  upon  the  government  of  India,  and  no  money 
is  levied  beyond  what  is  supposed  to  be  necessary  for 
this  purpose. 

Of  course  it  may  be  and  often  has  been  argued 
that  India  is  in  many  ways  sacrificed  to  England,  and 
in  particular  that  money  is  under  colourable  pretexts 
extorted  from  her.  I  am  not  now  concerned  with  this 
question,  because  I  am  inquiring  simply  what  is  the 
relation  established  by  law  between  India  and 
England,  and  not  how  far  that  relation  may  by 
abuse  have  been  perverted.  India  then  is  not  a  pos- 
session of  England  in  the  sense  of  being  legally  tribu- 
tary to  England,  any  more  than  any  of  our  colonies 
are  so. 

The  truth  is  that,  though  the  present  relation 
between  India  and  England  was  historically  created 
by  war,  yet  England  does  not,  at  least  openly,  claim 
any  rights  over  India  in  virtue  of  this  fact.  In  the 
Queen's  proclamation  of  1st  November  1858,  by 
which  the  open  assumption  of  the  government  by  the 


212  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

Queen  was  announced,  occur  the  express  words,  "  We 
hold  ourselves  bound  to  the  natives  of  our  Indian 
territories  by  the  same  obligations  of  duty  which  bind 
us  to  all  our  other  subjects."  That  is,  conquest 
confers  no  peculiar  rights,  or  India  is  not  for  practical 
purposes  a  conquered  country. 

In  fact,  though  the  advance  of  civilisation  has  not 
as  yet  abolished  wars  nor  even  perhaps  diminished 
the  frequency  of  them,  yet  it  has  very  much  trans- 
formed their  character.  Conquest  is  nominally  still 
possible,  but  the  word  has  changed  its  meaning.  It 
does  not  now  mean  spoliation  or  the  acquisition  of 
any  oppressive  lordship,  so  that  the  temptation  to 
make  conquests  is  now  very  much  diminished.  Thus 
our  possession  of  India  imposes  upon  us  vast  and 
almost  intolerable  responsibilities ;  this  is  evident ; 
but  it  is  not  at  once  evident  that  we  reap  any  benefit 
from  it. 

We  must  therefore  dismiss  from  our  minds  the 
idea  that  India  is  in  any  practical  sense  of  the  word 
a  possession  of  England.  In  ordinary  language  the 
two  notions  of  property  and  government  are  mixed 
up  in  a  way  that  produces  infinite  confusion.  When 
we  speak  of  India  as  "  our  magnificent  dependency  " 
or  "  the  brightest  jewel  in  the  English  diadem, "  we 
use  metaphors  which  have  come  down  to  us  from 
primitive  ages  and  from  a  state  of  society  which  has 
long  passed  away.  India  does  indeed  depend  on 
England  in  the  sense  that  England  determines  her 
condition  and  her  policy  and  that  she  is  governed  by 
Englishmen,  but  not  in  the  sense  that  she  renders 


n  THE  INDIAN  EMPIEE  213 

service  to  England  or  makes  England  directly  richer 
or  more  powerful.  And  thus  with  respect  to  India 
as  with  respect  to  the  colonies,  the  question  confronts 
us  on  the  threshold  of  the  subject,  What  is  the  use  of 
if?  Why  do  we  take  the  trouble  and  involve  our- 
selves in  the  anxiety  and  responsibility  of  governing 
two  hundred  millions  of  people  in  Asia  1 

Now  in  respect  to  the  colonies  I  argued  that  this 
question,  however  naturally  it  may  suggest  itself,  is 
perverse,  unless  it  can  be  shown  that  our  colonies  are 
too  remote  either  to  give  or  receive  any  advantage 
from  their  connection  with  us.  For  they  are  of  our 
own  blood,  a  mere  extension  of  the  English  nationality 
into  new  lands.  If  these  lands  were  contiguous  to 
England,  it  would  seem  a  matter  of  course  that  the 
English  population  as  it  increases  should  occupy 
them,  and  evidently  desirable  that  it  should  do  so 
without  a  political  separation.  As  they  are  not 
contiguous  but  remote,  a  certain  difficulty  arises,  but 
it  is  a  difficulty  which  in  these  days  of  steam  and 
electricity  does  not  seem  insurmountable.  Now  you 
see  that  this  argument  rests  entirely  upon  the  com- 
munity of  blood  between  England  and  her  colonies. 
It  does  not  therefore  apply  to  India.  Two  races 
could  scarcely  be  more  alien  from  each  other  than  the 
English  and  the  Hindus.  Comparative  philology  has 
indeed  discovered  one  link  that  had  never  been 
suspected  before.  The  language  of  the  prevalent  race 
of  India  is  indeed  of  the  same  family  as  our  own 
language.  But  in  every  other  respect  there  is  extreme 
alienation.    Their  traditions  do  not  touch  ours  at  any 


214  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

point.      Their  religion  is  further  removed,  from  our 
own  even  than  Mohammedanism. 

Our  colonies,  as  I  pointed  out,  were  in  the  main 
planted  in  the  emptier  parts  of  the  globe,  so  that 
their  population  is  for  the  most  part  either  entirely 
English  or  predominantly  so.  I  pointed  out  that 
this  was  not  the  case  with  the  colonies  of  Spain  in 
Central  and  Southern  America,  where  the  Spanish 
settlers  lived  in  the  midst  of  a  larger  population  of 
native  Indians,  whom  they  reduced  to  a  kind  of 
serfdom.  Here  then  are  two  kinds  of  dependency, 
of  which  the  one  is  much  more  closely  cognate  to  the 
mother-country  than  the  other.  But  both  are  con- 
nected by  real  ties  of  blood  with  the  mother-country. 
Now  India  belongs  to  neither  class,  because  its 
population  has  no  tie  of  blood  whatever  with  the 
population  of  England.  Even  if  colonies  had  gone 
out  from  England  to  India,  they  must  have  continued 
insignificant  in  comparison  to  the  enormous  native 
population;  but  there  have  been  no  such  colonies. 
England  is  separated  from  India  by  one  of  the  strong- 
est barriers  that  nature  could  set  up  between  the  two 
countries.  Nature  has  made  the  colonisation  of  India 
by  Englishmen  impossible  by  giving  her  a  climate  in 
which,  as  a  rule,  English  children  cannot  grow  up. 

And  thus,  while  the  connection  of  England  with 
her  colonies  is  in  the  highest  degree  natural,  her 
connection  with  India  seems  at  first  sight  at  least  to 
be  in  the  highest  degree  unnatural.  There  is  no 
natural  tie  whatever  between  the  two  countries.  No 
community  of  blood ;  no  community  of  religion,  for 


n  THE  INDIAN  EMPIRE  215 

we  come  as  Christians  into  a  population  divided 
betv/een  Brahminism  and  Mohammedanism.  And 
lastly,  no  community  of  interest,  except  so  much 
as  there  must  be  between  all  countries,  viz.  the 
interest  that  each  has  to  receive  the  commodities  of 
the  other.  For  otherwise  what  interest  can  England 
and  India  have  in  common  1  The  interests  of  England 
lie  in  Europe  and  in  the  New  World.  India,  so  far 
as  so  isolated  a  country  can  have  foreign  interests  at 
all,  looks  towards  Afghanistan,  Persia,  and  Central 
Asia,  countries  with  which,  except  through  India,  we 
should  scarcely  ever  have  had  any  communication. 

The  English  conquest  of  India  has  produced  results 
even  more  strange  than  the  Spanish  conquest  of 
America,  though  the  circumstances  of  it  were,  I 
think,  considerably  less  astonishing  and  romantic. 
Whether  we  think  of  it  with  satisfaction  or  not,  it  is 
the  most  striking  and  remarkable  incident  in  the 
modern  part  of  the  history  of  England.  In  a  history 
of  modern  England  it  deserves  a  prominent  place  in 
the  main  narrative,  and  not  the  mere  digression  or 
occasional  notice  which  our  historians  commonly 
assign  to  it.  But  how  important  it  is  we  shall  not 
see  so  long  as  we  only  consider  its  strangeness ;  we 
must  also  bear  in  mind  its  enormous  magnitude. 
Much  has  been  written  to  show  the  immensity  of  the 
task  we  have  undertaken  in  India ;  yet  with  surpris- 
ingly little  effect.  Figures  seem  only  to  paralyse  the 
imagination  when  they  pass  a  certain  magnitude,  and 
thus,  while  in  our  domestic  politics  we  grow  the  more 
interested  the  larger  the  question  at  issue  is  shown  to 


216  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

be,  we  cease  to  be  interested  when  our '  Empire  with 
its  much  vaster  questions  is  brought  before  us.  Point 
out  that  this  Indian  Empire  is  something  like  what 
the  Roman  Empire  was  at  its  greatest  extension,  and 
that  we  are  responsible  for  it;  the  only  effect  pro- 
duced is  a  disinclination  to  attend  to  the  subject.  Can 
we  seriously  justify  this"?  I  fancy  we  are  in  some 
degree  misled  by  an  impression  that  in  the  outlying 
parts  of  the  world  large  dimensions  are  a  matter 
of  course  and  make  no  diflference.  Thus  if  India  is 
large,  Canada  and  Australia  are  still  larger,  and  yet  we 
do  not  find  that  the  affairs  of  Canada  and  Australia 
require  much  of  our  attention.  True,  but  we  over- 
look an  important  distinction.  In  Canada  and 
Australia  the  territory  is  vast,  but  the  population 
exceedingly  small ;  the  country  also  is  not  merely 
distant  from  us,  as  India  is,  but  also  distant  from  all 
the  great  Powers  with  which  we  might  possibly  en- 
gage in  war.  India  really  belongs  to  quite  a  different 
category  of  countries.  It  is  a  country  as  populous 
and  in  some  large  regions  more  populous  than  the 
most  thickly  peopled  part^of  Europe.  It  is  a  country 
in  which  we  have  over  and  over  again  had  to  wage 
war  on  a  grand  scale.  Thus  in  the  second  Mahratta 
war  of  1818  Lord  Hastings  brought  into  the  field 
more  than  a  hundred  thousand  men.  And,  distant 
as  it  may  seem,  it  is  by  no  means  out  of  the  range  of 
European  politics.  Thus  throughout  the  eighteenth 
century  it  was  part  of  the  chess-board  on  which 
France  and  England  played  out  their  game  of  skill. 
Again  since  about  1830  India,  and  India  almost  alone, 


II  THE  INDIAN  EMPIRE  217 

has  involved  us  in  differences  with  Eussia,  and  given 
us  a  most  intimate  interest  in  the  solution  of  the 
Eastern  Question. 

India  therefore  is  rather  to  be  compared  to  the 
countries  of  Europe  than  to  the  outlying,  thinly- 
peopled  countries  of  the  New  World.  Let  us  then 
contemplate  a  little  the  magnitude  of  this  Empire, 
and  take  some  pains  to  realise  it  by  comparing  it  to 
other  magnitudes  with  which  we  are  familiar.  Let 
us  think  then  of  Europe  without  Eussia — that  is,  of 
all  that  system  of  countries  which  a  few  centuries 
ago  formed  almost  the  whole  scene  of  civilised  history, 
all  the  European  countries  of  the  Eoman  Empire 
plus  the  whole  of  Germany,  the  Slavonic  countries 
which  are  outside  Eussia,  and  the  Scandinavian 
countries.  India  may  be  roughly  said  to  be  about 
equal  both  in  area  and  population  to  all  these  coim- 
tries  taken  together.  This  Empire,  which  we  now 
govern  from  Downing  Street,  and  whose  budget  forms 
the  annual  annoyance  and  despair  of  the  House  of 
Commons,  is  considerably  larger  and  more  populous 
than  the  Empire  of  Napoleon  when  it  had  reached 
its  utmost  extent.  And,  as  I  have  said  already,  it  is 
an  Empire  of  the  same  kind,  not  some  vast  empty 
region  like  the  old  Spanish  Dominion  in  South 
America,  but  a  crowded  territory  with  an  ancient 
civilisation,  with  languages,  religions,  philosophies 
and  literatures  of  its  own. 

I  think  perhaps  it  may  assist  conception  if  I  split 
up  this  immense  total  into  parts.  The  reason,  no 
doubt,  why  the  thought  of  all  Europe  together  im- 


218  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leci. 

presses  us  so  much,  is  that  there  passes  before  the 
mind  a  series  of  six  or  seven  great  states  which  must 
be  added  together  to  make  up  Europe.  Our  con- 
ception of  Europe  is  the  sum  of  our  conceptions  of 
England,  France,  Germany,  Austria,  Italy,  Spain,  and 
Greece.  Perhaps  the  name  India  would  strike  aa 
majestically  upon  the  ear,  if  in  like  manner  it  were  to 
us  the  name  of  a  grand  complex  total.  Let  me  say 
then  that  in  the  first  place  it  has  one  region  which  in 
population  far  exceeds  any  European  State  except 
Eussia,  and  exceeds  the  United  States.  This  is  the 
region  governed  by  the  Lieutenant-Governor  of 
Bengal,  Its  population  is  stated  actually  to  exceed 
66,000,000  on  an  area  considerably  less  than  that  of 
France.  Then  come  two  other  regions  which  may 
be  compared  with  European  States.  These  are  the 
North- West  Provinces,  which  answer  pretty  well  to 
Great  Britain  without  Ireland,  being  in  area  some- 
what smaller,  but  somewhat  more  populous.  Next 
comes  the  Madras  Presidency,  larger  in  area — being 
about  equal  to  Great  Britain  with  Ireland — but  less 
populous,  being  about  equal  in  population  to  the 
Kingdom  of  Italy.  The  population  in  all  these  three 
cases  rises  far  above  20,000,000.  Then  come  two 
provinces  in  which  it  approaches  20,000,000,  the 
Punjab,  which  is  somewhat  superior  in  population  to 
Spain,  and  the  Bombay  Presidency,  which  is  slightly 
inferior,  though  in  area  it  is  equal  to  Great  Britain 
and  Ireland.  In  the  next  class  come  Oude,  which  is 
rather  superior,  and  the  Central  Provinces,  which  are 
about  equal,  to  Belgium  and  Holland  taken  together. 


II  THE  INDIAN  EMPIRE  219 

These  provinces,  together  with  some  others  of  less 
importance,  make  up  that  part  of  India  which  is 
directly  under  English  government.  But  the  region 
which  is  pi'actically  under  English  supremacy  is  still 
larger.  When  we  speak  of  the  Empire  of  Napo- 
leon, we  do  not  think  only  of  the  territory  directly 
governed  by  his  officials;  we  reckon -in  States 
nominally  sovereign,  which  were  practically  under 
his  ascendency.  Thus  the  Confederation  of  the  Rhine 
consisted  of  a  number  of  German  states  which  had  by 
a  formal  act  consented  to  regard  Napoleon  as  their 
Protector.  Now  England  has  a  similar  dependent 
confederation  in  India,  and  this  makes  an  additional 
item  which,  reckoned  by  population,  is  superior  to 
the  United  States. 

Is  it  possible  that  besides  our  terrible  hive  of 
population  at  home,  giving  rise  to  most  anxious 
politics,  and  besides  our  vast  colonial  Empire,  we  are 
also  responsible  for  another  Empire  densely  peopled 
and  about  equal  to  Europe  ?  Is  it  possible  that  about 
this  Empire  we  neither  have,  nor  care  to  acquire,  the 
most  rudimentary  information  ?  Would  it  be  possible 
for  us,  even  if  we  did  try  to  acquire  such  information, 
to  form  a  rational  opinion  about  affairs  so  remote  and 
complicated  ? 

There  have  been  great  Empires  before  now,  but 
the  government  of  them  has  generally  been  in  the 
hands  of  a  few  experts.  Rome  was  forced  to  commit 
her  Empire  to  the  care  of  a  single  irresponsible 
statesman,  and  could  not  even  reserve  for  herself  her 
old  civic  liberties.     In  the  United  States  we  do  indeed 


220  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

see  a  boundless  dominion  successfully  guided  under  a 
democratic  system.  But  the  territory  in  this  case, 
extensive  though  it  be,  is  all  compact  and  continuous, 
and  the  population,  however  large  it  may  come  to  be, 
will  still  be  in  the  main  homogeneous.  If  the  United 
States  should  come  into  the  possession  of  countries 
separated  from  her  by  the  sea,  and  of  different  nation- 
ality, her  position  in  the  world  would  be  at  once 
essentially  altered.  What  is  unprecedented  in  the 
relation  of  England  to  India  is  the  attempt  to  rule, 
not  merely  by  experts,  but  by  a  system  founded  on 
public  opinion,  a  population  not  merely  distant,  but 
wholly  alien,  wholly  unlike  in  ways  of  thinking,  to 
the  sovereign  public.  Public  opinion  is  necessarily 
guided  by  a  few  large,  plain,  simple  ideas.  When  the 
great  interests  of  the  country  arc  plain,  and  the  great 
maxims  of  its  government  unmistakable,  it  may  be 
able  to  judge  securely  even  in  questions  of  vast 
magnitude.  But  public  opinion  is  liable  to  be  be- 
wildered when  it  is  called  on  to  enter  into  subtleties, 
draw  nice  distinctions,  apply  one  set  of  principles 
here  and  another  set  there.  Such  bewilderment  our 
Indian  Empire  produces.  It  is  so  different  in  kind 
both  from  England  itself  and  from  the  Colonial 
Empire  that  it  requires  wholly  different  principles  of 
policy.  And  therefore  public  opinion  does  not  know 
what  to  make  of  it,  but  looks  with  blank  indignation 
and  despair  upon  a  Government  which  seems  utterly 
un-English,  which  is  bureaucratic  and  in  the  hands 
of  a  ruling  race,  which  rests  mainly  on  military  force, 
which  raises  its  revenue,  not  in  the  European  fashion, 


II  THE  INDIAN  EMPIKE  221 

but  by  monopolies  of  salt  and  opium,  and  by  taking 
the  place  of  a  universal  landlord,  and  in  a  hundred 
other  ways  departs  from  the  traditions  of  England. 

And  it  may  be  asked,  For  what  end  ?  As  I  have 
remarked,  the  connection  itself  is  not  directly  profitable 
to  England.  We  must  look  therefore  to  advantages 
which  may  come  to  us  from  it  indirectly.  We  find 
then  that  the  trade  between  the  two  countries  has 
gradually  grown  to  be  very  great  indeed.  The  loss 
of  the  Indian  trade  which  might  follow  if  the  country 
fell  again  into  anarchy  or  under  a  Government  which 
closed  its  harbours  to  our  merchants,  would  amount 
to  £60,000,000  annually.  But  we  are  to  set  over 
against  this  advantage  the  great  burden  which  is 
imposed  by  India  upon  our  foreign  policy.  In  the 
present  state  of  the  world  a  dependency  held  by 
military  force  may  easily  be  Hke  a  millstone  round 
the  neck  of  a  nation;  for  it  may  lock  up  an  army 
which  the  nation  may  grievously  need  for  other 
purposes  or  even  for  defence.  We  all  conceive  with 
what  satisfaction  Bismarck  at  the  present  moment 
sees  France  undertaking  schemes  of  conquest  in  Africa 
and  Asia.  Now  if  England,  which  is  not  a  military 
state,  had  in  reality  to  hold  down  by  English  military 
force  a  population  of  two  hundred  millions,  it  is 
needless  to  say  that  such  a  burden  would  overwhelm 
us.  This  is  not  so,  owing  to  a  fundamental  peculiarity 
of  the  Indian  Empire,  upon  which  I  shall  enlarge 
later,  the  peculiarity,  namely,  that  in  the  main  England 
conquered  India  and  now  keeps  it  by  means  of  Indian 
troops  paid  with  Indian  money.     We  keep  there  only 


222  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

an  English  army  of  65,000  men.  But  this  is  by  no 
means  the  whole  of  the  burden  which  India  lays  upon 
us.  India,  at  the  same  time  that  she  locks  up  an 
army,  more  than  doubles  the  difficulty  of  our  foreign 
policy.  The  supreme  happiness  for  a  country  of 
course  is  to  be  self-contained,  to  have  no  need  to 
inquire  what  other  nations  are  doing.  Very  wisely 
did  "Washington  advise  his  countrymen  to  retain  this 
happiness  as  long  as  they  could,  England  cannot 
well  enjoy  it,  but  if  she  did  not  possess  India  she 
might  enjoy  it  comparatively.  Her  colonies  as  yet 
have  for  the  most  part  only  peaceful  or  insignificant 
or  barbarous  neighbours,  and  our  old  close  interest 
in  European  struggles  has  passed  away.  But  we 
continue  to  be  anxiously  interested  in  the  East. 
Every  movement  in  Turkey,  every  new  symptom  in 
Egypt,  any  stirring  in  Persia  or  Transoxiana  or 
Burmah  or  Afghanistan,  we  are  obliged  to  watch 
with  vigilance.  The  reason  is  that  we  have  possession 
of  India.  Owing  to  this  we  have  a  leading  position 
in  the  system  of  Asiatic  Powers,  and  a  leading 
interest  in  the  affairs  of  all  those  countries  which  lie 
upon  the  route  to  India.  This  and  this  only  involves 
us  in  that  permanent  rivalry  with  Russia,  which  is  to 
England  in  the  nineteenth  century  what  the  competi- 
tion with  France  for  the  New  World  was  to  her  in 
the  eighteenth. 

My  object  in  this  lecture  is  to  lay  before  you  the 
Indian  question  in  its  broad  outlines.  I  have  put 
together  at  the  outset  some  considerations  which 
might  incline  us  to  take  an  anxious  or  desponding 


II  THE  INDIAN  EMPIEE  223 

view  of  it.  If  it  is  doubtful  whether,  we  reap  any 
balance  of  advantage  from  our  Indian  Empire,  and  if 
it  is  not  doubtful  that  it  involves  us  in  enormous 
responsibilities  and  confuses  our  minds  with  problems 
of  hopeless  difficulty,  may  we  not  feel  tempted  to 
exclaim  that  it  was  an  evil  hour  for  England  when 
the  daring  genius  of  Clive  turned  a  trading  company 
into  a  political  Power,  and  inaugurated  a  hundred 
years  of  continuous  conquest  1  Must  we  not  at  least 
hold,  as  many  among  the  distinguished  statesmen 
who  have  devoted  their  lives  to  Indian  affairs  have 
held,  that  the  Empire  is  ephemeral,  and  that  the 
time  is  not  far  off  when  we  must  withdraw  from 
the  country  ? 

On  the  other  hand  the  wisest  men  may  easily  be 
mistaken  when  they  speculate  on  such  a  subject. 
The  end  of  our  Indian  Empire  is  perhaps  almost  as 
much  beyond  calculation  as  the  beginning  of  it. 
There  is  no  analogy  in  history  either  for  one  or  the 
other.  If  the  government  of  India  from  a  remote 
island  seems  a  thing  which  can  never  be  permanent, 
we  know  that  it  once  seemed  a  thing  which  could 
never  take  place,  until  it  did  take  place.  At  any 
rate,  if  the  Empire  is  to  fall,  we  ought  to  be  able  to 
point  already  to  proofs  of  its  decline.  Proofs  certainly 
we  can  show  of  the  immense  difficulties  it  has  to  con- 
tend with,  but  scarcely  symptoms  of  anything  which 
can  be  called  decline.  And  again  if  we  should  admit, 
or  not  deny,  that  England  has  not  been  repaid  in  any 
way  for  the  trouble  that  this  dependency  has  cost 
her,  the  admission  by  itself  would  have  no  practical 


224  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

importance.  Between  such  an  admission  and  any 
practical  project,  such  as  that  of  abandoning  the 
Empire,  there  is  a  gulf  fixed. 

It  is  possible  to  hold  that  England  would  be  better 
off  now  had  she  founded  no  such  Empire  at  all,  had 
she  remained  standing,  as  a  mere  merchant,  on  the 
threshold  of  India,  as  she  stands  now  on  that  of 
China.  But  the  abandonment  of  India  is  an  idea 
which  even  those  who  believe  that  we  shall  one  day 
be  driven  to  it  are  not  accustomed  to  contemplate  as 
a  practical  scheme.  There  are  some  deeds  which, 
though  they  had  been  better  not  done,  cannot  be 
undone.  A  time  may  conceivably  come  when  it  may 
be  practicable  to  leave  India  to  herself,  but  for  the 
present  it  is  necessary  to  govern  her  as  if  we  were  to 
govern  her  for  ever.  Why  so  1  Not  mainly  on  our 
own  account.  Some  tell  us  that  our  honour  requires 
us  to  maintain  the  acquisition  which  our  fathers 
made  with  their  blood,  and  which  is  the  great 
military  trophy  of  the  nation.  To  my  mind  there  is 
something  monstrous  in  all  such  notions  of  honour; 
they  belong  to  that  primitive  and  utterly  obsolete 
class  of  notions,  of  which  I  have  spoken  before, 
which  rest  upon  a  confusion  between  the  ideas  of 
government  and  property.  Nothing  is  to  be  con- 
sidered for  a  moment  but  the  well-being  of  India 
and  England,  and  of  the  two  countries  India,  as  being 
by  much  the  more  nearly  interested,  by  much  the 
larger,  and  by  much  the  poorer,  is  to  be  considered 
before  England.  But  on  these  very  principles,  and 
especially  on  account  of  the  interest  of  India,  it  is 


II  THE  INDUN  EMPIRE  225 

impossible  for  the  present  to  think  of  abandoning 
the  task  we  have  undertaken  there.  We  might  do 
so  if  our  own  interest  alone  were  considered.  Not 
that  it  would  be  easy,  now  that  such  a  vast  trade  has 
grown  up  and  such  vast  sums  of  English  money, 
particularly  in  these  latest  years,  have  been  invested 
in  the  country.  But  it  would  be  possible.  On  the 
other  hand  if  we  consider  the  interest  of  India,  it 
appears  wholly  impossible.  Much  may  be  plausibly 
alleged  against  the  system  under  which  we  govern 
India.  It  may  be  doubted  whether  it  is  altogether 
suited  to  the  people,  whether  it  is  not  needlessly 
expensive,  and  so  forth.  We  may  feel  a  reasonable 
anxiety  as  to  what  will  come  in  the  end  of  this 
unparalleled  experiment.  But  I  think  it  would  be  a 
very  extreme  view  to  deny  that  our  Government  is 
better  than  any  other  which  has  existed  in  India 
since  the  Mussulman  conquest.  If  it  should  ulti- 
mately fail  more  than  any  one  imagines,  we  could 
never  leave  the  country  in  a  state  half  so  deplorable 
as  that  in  which  we  found  it.  A  very  moderately 
good  Government  is  incomparably  better  than  none. 
The  sudden  withdrawal  even  of  an  oppressive 
Government  is  a  dangerous  experiment.  Some 
countries,  no  doubt,  there  are,  which  might  pass 
through  such  a  trial  without  falling  into  anarchy. 
Thinly-peopled  countries,  or  countries  whose  inhabit- 
ants had  been  long  accustomed  to  much  freedom  of 
action,  might  be  trusted  to  devise  for  themselves 
very  speedily  as  much  government  as  might  be 
necessary.  But  Avhat  a  mockery  to  lay  down  such 
Q 


226  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

propositions  with  India  in  view !  When  we  began 
to  take  possession  of  the  country,  it  was  already  in 
a  state  of  wild  anarchy  such  as  Europe  has  perhaps 
never  known.  What  government  it  had  was  pretty 
invariably  despotic,  and  was  generally  in  the  hands 
of  military  adventurers,  depending  on  a  soldiery 
composed  of  bandits  whose  whole  vocation  was 
plunder.  The  Mahratta  Power  covered  the  greater 
part  of  India  and  threatened  at  once  Delhi  and 
Calcutta,  while  it  had  its  headquarters  at  Poonah, 
and  yet  this  power  was  but  an  organisation  of 
pillage.  Meanwhile  in  the  North,  Nadir  Shah 
rivalled  Attila  or  Tamerlane  in  his  devastating 
expeditions.  It  may  be  said  that  this  was  only  a 
passing  anarchy  produced  by  the  dissolution  of  the 
Mogul  Empire.  Even  so,  it  would  show  that  India 
is  not  a  country  which  can  endure  the  withdrawal 
of  Government.  But  have  we  not  a  somewhat 
exaggerated  idea  of  the  Mogul  Empire?  Its  great- 
ness was  extremely  short-lived,  and  in  the  Deccan  it 
seems  never  really  to  have  established  itself.  The 
anarchy  which  Clive  and  Hastings  found  in  India 
was  not  so  exceptional  a  state  of  things  as  it  might 
seem.  Probably  it  was  much  more  intense  at  that 
moment  than  ever  before,  but  a  condition  of  anarchy 
seems  almost  to  have  been  chronic  in  India  since 
Mahmoud,  and  to  have  been  but  suspended  for  a 
while  in  the  Northern  half  by  Akber  and  Shah 
Jehan. 

India  then  is  of  all  countries  that  which  is  least 
capable  of  evolving  out  of  itself  a  stable  Government 


II  THE  INDIAN  EMPIRE  227 

And  it  is  to  be  feared  that  our  rule  may  have 
diminished  what  little  power  of  this  sort  it  may  have 
originally  possessed.  For  our  supremacy  has  neces- 
sarily depressed  those  classes  which  had  anything  of 
the  talent  or  habit  of  government.  The  old  royal 
races,  the  noble  classes,  and  in  particular  the  Mussul- 
mans who  formed  the  bulk  of  the  official  class  under 
the  Great  Moguls,  have  suffered  most  and  benefited 
least  from  our  rule.  This  decay  is  the  staple  topic 
of  lamentation  among  those  who  take  a  dark  view  of 
our  Empire  ;  but  is  it  not  an  additional  reason  why 
the  Empire  should  continue?  Then  think  of  the 
immense  magnitude  of  the  country ;  think  too  that 
we  have  undermined  all  fixed  moral  and  religious 
ideas  in  the  intellectual  classes  by  introducing  the 
science  of  the  West  into  the  midst  of  Brahminical 
traditions.  When  you  have  made  all  these  reflec- 
tions, you  will  see  that  to  withdraw  oui-  Government 
from  a  country  which  is  dependent  on  it,  and  which 
we  have  made  incapable  of  depending  upon  anything 
else,  would  be  the  most  inexcusable  of  all  conceivable 
crimes,  and  might  possibly  cause  the  most  stupendous 
of  all  conceivable  calamities. 

Such  then  in  its  broad  outline  is  the  Indian 
Question  of  the  present  day.  In  what  way  did  such 
a  question  grow  up  1  How  did  we  come  into  posses- 
sion of  a  dependency  so  enormous  ? 


LECTUEE  III 

HOW   WE    CONQUERED    INDIA 

The  question  how  we  conquered  India  does  not  at 
all  resemble  the  questions  which  I  raised  in  the  last 
course.  Our  colonists  in  the  new  world  occupied,  to 
be  sure,  a  vast  territory,  but  it  was  comparatively 
an  empty  territory.  The  difficulties  they  encountered 
arose  not  so  much  from  the  natives,  as  from  the 
rivalry  of  other  European  nations.  By  what  degrees 
and  from  what  causes  we  gained  the  advantage  over 
these  rivals,  I  partly  discussed.  It  was  a  question  to 
which  the  answer  was  not  at  once  obvious,  but  at  the 
same  time  not  extremely  difficult  to  find.  On  the 
other  hand  it  is  at  first  sight  extremely  perplexing 
to  understand  how  we  could  conquer  India.  Here 
the  population  was  dense,  and  its  civilisation,  though 
descending  along  a  different  stream  of  tradition,  was 
as  real  and  ancient  as  our  own.  We  have  learnt 
from  many  instances  in  European  history  to  think  it 
almost  impossible  really  to  conquer  an  intelligent 
people  wholly  alien  in  language  and  religion  from  its 


LECT.  Ill  HOW  WE  CONQUERED  INDIA  229 

invaders.  The  whole  power  of  Spain  could  not  in 
eighty  years  conquer  the  Dutch  provinces  with  their 
petty  population.  The  Swiss  could  not  be  conquered 
in  old  time,  nor  the  Greeks  the  other  day.  Nay,  at 
the  very  time  when  we  made  the  first  steps  in  the 
conquest  of  India,  we  showed  ourselves  wholly  un- 
able to  reduce  to  obedience  three  millions  of  our  own 
race  in  America,  who  had  thrown  off  their  allegiance 
to  the  English  Crown.  What  a  singular  contrast  is 
here  !  Never  did  the  English  show  so  much  languid 
incompetence  as  in  the  American  War,  so  that  it 
might  have  seemed  evident  that  their  age  of  greatness 
was  over,  and  that  the  decline  of  England  had  begun. 
But  precisely  at  this  time  they  were  appearing  as 
irresistible  conquerors  in  India,  and  showing  a  superior- 
ity which  led  them  to  fancy  themselves  a  nation  of 
heroes.     How  is  the  contradiction  to  be  explained  1 

History  is  studied  with  so  little  seriousness,  with 
so  little  desire  or  expectation  of  arriving  at  any  solid 
result,  that  the  contradiction  passes  almost  unre- 
marked, or  at  most  gives  occasion  to  a  tiiumphant 
reflection  that  after  all  there  was  life  in  us  yet. 
And  indeed  it  may  seem  that,  however  difficult  of 
explanation  the  fact  may  be,  there  can  be  no  doubt 
of  it.  Over  and  over  again  in  India,  at  Plassey,  at 
Assaye,  and  on  a  hundred  other  battlefields,  our 
troops  have  been  victorious  against  great  odds,  so 
that  here  at  least  it  seems  that  we  may  indidgc  our 
national  self-complacency  without  restraint,  and  feel 
that  at  any  rate  in  comparison  with  the  Hindu  races 
we  really  are  terrible  fellows  i 


230  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

But  does  this  hypothesis  really  remove  the  diffi- 
culty 1  Suppose  that  one  Englishman  is  really  equal 
as  a  soldier  to  ten  or  twenty  Hindus,  can  we  even 
then  conceive  the  whole  of  India  conquered  by  the 
English  'i  There  were  not  more  than  twelve  millions 
of  Englishmen  at  the  time  when  the  conquest  began, 
and  it  was  made  in  a  period  when  England  had  other 
wars  on  her  hands.  Olive's  career  falls  partly  in  the 
Seven  Years'  War  of  Europe,  and  the  great  annexa- 
tions of  Lord  Wellesley  were  made  in  the  midst  of 
our  war  with  Napoleon.  We  are  not  a  military 
state.  We  did  not  in  those  times  profess  to  be  able 
to  put  on  foot  at  any  moment  a  great  expeditionary 
army.  Accordingly  in  our  European  wars  we  usually 
confined  ourselves  to  acting  with  our  fleet,  while  for 
hostilities  on  land  it  was  our  practice  to  subsidise 
any  ally  we  might  have  among  the  military  states, 
at  one  time  Austria,  at  another  Prussia.  How  then 
in  spite  of  all  this  weakness  by  land  could  we  manage 
to  conquer  during  this  time  the  greater  part  of  India, 
an  enormous  region  of  nearly  a  million  square  miles 
and  inhabited  by  two  hundred  millions  of  people! 
What  a  drain  such  a  work  must  have  made  upon 
our  military  force,  what  a  drain  upon  our  treasury  ! 
And  yet  somehow  the  drain  seems  never  to  have 
been  perceived.  Our  European  wars  involved  us  in 
a  debt  that  we  have  never  been  able  to  pay.  But 
our  Indian  wars  have  not  swelled  the  National  Debt. 
The  exertions  we  had  to  make  there  seem  to  have 
left  no  trace  behind  them. 

It  seems  then  that  there  must  be  something  wrong 


Ill  HOW  WE  CONQUEKED  INDIA  231 

in  the  conception  which  is  current,  that  a  number  of 
soldiers  went  over  from  England  to  India,  and  there 
by  sheer  superiority  in  valour  and  intelligence  con- 
quered the  whole  country.  In  the  last  great 
Mahratta  war  of  1818  we  had,  it  appears,  more  than 
a  hundred  thousand  men  in  the  field.  But  what ! 
that  was  the  time  of  mortal  exhaustion  that  succeeded 
the  great  Napoleonic  War.  Is  it  possible  that  only 
three  years  after  the  battle  of  Waterloo  we  were  at 
war  again  on  a  vast  scale  and  had  a  much  greater 
army  in  India  than  Lord  Wellington  had  in  Spain  1 
Again  at  the  present  moment  the  army  kept  in  foot 
in  India  amounts  to  two  hundred  thousand  men. 
What !  two  hundred  thousand  English  soldiers ! 
And  yet  we  are  not  a  military  State  ! 

You  see  of  course  what  the  fact  is  that  I  point  at. 
This  Indian  army,  we  all  know,  does  not  consist  of 
English  soldiers,  but  mainly  of  native  troops.  Out 
of  200,000  only  65,000,  or  less  than  a  third,  are 
English.  And  even  this  proportion  has  only  been 
established  since  the  mutiny,  after  which  catastrophe 
the  English  troops  were  increased  and  the  native 
troops  diminished  in  number.  Thus  I  find  that  at 
the  time  of  the  mutiny  there  were  45,000  European 
troops  to  235,000  native  troops  in  India — that  is,  less 
than  a  fifth.  In  1808  again  I  find  only  25,000 
Englishmen  to  130,000  natives — that  is,  somewhat  less 
than*  a  fifth.  The  same  proportion  obtained  in  1773 
at  the  time  of  the  Kegulating  Act,  when  British 
India  first  took  shape.  At  that  date  the  Company's 
army  consisted  of  9000  Europeans  and  45,000  natives. 


232  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LECt. 

Before  that  I  find  the  proportion  of  Europeans  even 
lower — about  a  seventh ;  and  if  we  go  back  to  the 
very  beginning  we  find  that  from  the  first  the  Indian 
army  was  rather  a  native  than  a  European  force. 
Thus  Colonel  Chesney  opens  his  historical  view  of 
it  in  these  words :  "  The  first  establishment  of  the 
Company's  Indian  Army  may  be  considered  to  date 
from  the  year  1748,  when  a  small  body  of  sepoys 
was  raised  at  Madras  after  the  example  set  by  the 
French,  for  the  defence  of  that  settlement.  ...  At 
the  same  time  a  small  European  force  was  raised, 
formed  of  such  sailors  as  could  be  spared  from  the 
ships  on  the  coast  and  of  men  smuggled  on  board  the 
Company's  vessels  in  England  by  the  crimps." 

In  the  early  battles  of  the  Company  by  which  its 
power  was  decisively  established,  at  the  siege  of 
Arcot,  at  Plassey,  at  Buxar,  there  seem  almost  always 
to  have  been  more  sepoys  than  Europeans  on  the  side 
of  the  Company.  And  let  us  observe  further  that  we 
do  not  hear  of  the  sepoys  as  fighting  ill,  or  of  the 
English  as  bearing  the  whole  brunt  of  the  conflict. 
No  one  who  has  remarked  the  childish  eagerness  with 
which  historians  indulge  their  national  vanity,  will 
be  surprised  to  find  that  our  English  writers  in 
describing  these  battles  seem  unable  to  discern  the 
sepoys.  Eead  Macaulay's  Essay  on  Clive  ;  every- 
where it  is  "  the  imperial  people,"  "  the  mighty 
children  of  the  sea,"  "  none  could  resist  Clive  and  his 
Englishmen."  But  if  once  it  is  admitted  that  the 
sepoys  always  outnumbered  the  English,  and  that 
they  kept   pace  with    the   English   in    efficiency   aa 


in  HOW  WE  CONQUERED  INDIA  233 

soldiers,  the  whole  theory  which  attributes  our 
successes  to  an  immeasurable  natural  superiority  in 
valouf  falls  to  the  ground.  In  those  battles  in  which 
our  troops  were  to  the  enemy  as  one  to  ten,  it  will 
appear  that  if  we  may  say  that  one  Englishman 
shoAved  himself  equal  to  ten  natives,  we  may  also  say 
that  one  sepoy  did  the  same.  It  follows  that,  though 
no  doubt  there  w^as  a  difference,  it  was  not  so  much  a 
difference  of  race  as  a  difference  of  discipline,  of 
military  science,  and  also  no  doubt  in  many  cases  a 
difference  of  leadership. 

Oljserve  that  Mill's  summary  explanation  of  the 
conquest  of  India  says  nothing  of  any  natiu-al  supe- 
riority on  the  part  of  the  English.  "The  two 
important  discoveries  for  conquering  India  were : 
1st,  the  weakness  of  the  native  armies  against 
European  discipline ;  2ndly,  the  facility  of  imparting 
that  discipline  to  natives  in  the  Euroi)ean  service." 
He  adds :  "  Both  discoveries  were  made  by  the 
French." 

And  even  if  we  should  admit  that  the  English 
fought  better  than  the  sepoys,  and  took  more  than 
their  share  in  those  achievements  which  both  per- 
formed in  common,  it  remains  entirely  incorrect  to 
speak  of  the  English  nation  as  having  conquered  the 
nations  of  India.  The  nations  of  India  have  been 
conquered  by  an  army  of  which  on  the  average  about 
a  fifth  part  was  English.  But  we  not  only  exaggerate 
our  own  share  in  the  achievement ;  we  at  the  same 
time  entirely  misconceive  and  misdescribe  the  achieve- 
ment itself.     For  from  what  race  were  the  other  four 


234  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

fifths  of  the  army  drawn  1  From  the  natives  of  India 
themselves !  India  can  hardly  be  said  to  have  been 
conquered  at  all  by  foreigners ;  she  has  rather 
conquered  herself.  If  we  were  justified,  which  we 
are  not,  in  personifying  India  as  we  personify  France 
or  England,  we  could  not  describe  her  as  over- 
whelmed by  a  foreign  enemy  ;  we  should  rather  have 
to  say  that  she  elected  to  put  an  end  to  anarchy  by 
submitting  to  a  single  Government,  even  though 
that  Government  was  in  the  hands  of  foreigners. 

But  that  description  would  be  as  false  and  mis- 
leading as  the  other,  or  as  any  expression  which 
presupposes  India  to  have  been  a  conscious  political 
whole.  The  truth  is  that  there  was  no  India  in  the 
political,  and  scarcely  in  any  other,  sense.  The  word 
was  a  geographical  expression,  and  therefore  India 
was  easily  conquered,  just  as  Italy  and  Germany  fell 
an  easy  prey  to  Napoleon,  because  there  was  no 
Italy  and  no  Germany,  and  not  even  any  strong 
Italian  or  German  national  feeling.  Because  there 
was  no  Germany,  Napoleon  was  able  to  set  one 
German  state  against  another,  so  that  in  fighting 
with  Austria  or  Prussia  he  had  Bavaria  and  Wiirttem- 
berg  for  allies.  As  Napoleon  saw  that  this  means  of 
conquest  lay  ready  to  his  hand  in  Central  Europe,  so 
the  Frenchman  Dupleix  early  perceived  that  this  road 
to  empire  in  India  lay  open  to  any  European  state 
that  might  have  factories  there.  He  saw  a  condition 
of  chronic  war  between  one  Indian  state  and  another, 
and  he  perceived  that  by  interfering  in  their  quarrels 
the  foreigner  might  arrive  to  hold  the  balance  be- 


lU  HOW  WE  CONQUERED  INDIA  235 

tween  them.  He  acted  upon  this  view,  and  accord- 
ingly the  whole  history  of  European  Empire  in  India 
begins  with  the  interference  of  the  French  in  the 
war  of  succession  in  Hyderabad  that  broke  out  on  the 
death  of  the  great  Nizam  ul  Mulk  (1748). 

The  fundamental  fact  then  is  that  India  had  no 
jealousy  of  the  foreigner,  because  India  had  no  sense 
whatever   of  national   unity,   because   there  was  no 
India,  and  therefore,  properly  speaking,  no  foreigner. 
So  far,  as  I  have  pointed  out,  parallel  examples  may 
be  found  in  Europe.     But  we  must  imagine  a  much 
greater  degree  of  political  deadness  in  India  than  in 
Germany  eighty  years  ago,  if  we  would  understand 
the   fact  now  under  consideration,  the  fact  namely 
that   the  English  conquered  India  by   means   of   a 
sepoy  army.     In  Germany  there  was  scarcely  any 
German   feeling,   but  there  was   a  certain  amount, 
though  not  a  very  great  amount,  of  Prussian  feeling, 
Austrian  feeling,  Bavarian  feeling,  Suabian  feeling. 
Napoleon  is  able  to  set  Bavaria  against  Austria  or 
both  against  Prussia,  but  he  does  not  attempt  to  set 
Bavaria   or   Austria   or  Prussia   against   itself.     To 
speak  more  distinctly,  he  procures  by  treaties  that 
the  Elector  of  Bavaria  shall  furnish  a  contingent  to 
the  army  which  he  leads  against  Austria;  but  he 
does  not,  simply  by  offering  pay,  raise  an  army  of 
Germans   and   then   use   them   in   the   conquest   of 
Germany.     This  would  be  the  exact  parallel  to  what 
lias  been  witnessed  in  India.     A  parallel  to  the  fact 
that  India  has  been  conquered  by  an  army  of  which 
four-fifths  were  natives  and  only  one -fifth  English, 


236  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LEOT. 

would  be  found  in  Europe,  if  England  had  invaded 
France,  and  then  by  offering  good  pay  had  raised  an 
army  of  Frenchmen  large  enough  to  conquer  the 
country.  The  very  idea  seems  monstrous.  What ! 
you  exclaim,  an  army  of  Frenchmen  quietly  under- 
take to  make  war  upon  France !  And  yet,  if  you 
reflect,  you  will  see  that  such  a  thing  is  abstractedly 
quite  possible,  and  that  it  might  have  been  witnessed 
if  the  past  history  of  France  had  been  different.  We 
can  imagine  that  a  national  feeling  had  never  sprung 
up  in  France ;  this  we  can  easily  imagine,  because  we 
know  that  the  twelfth  century  is  full  of  wars  between 
a  king  who  reigned  at  Paris  and  another  who  reigned 
at  Rouen.  But  let  us  imagine  further  that  the 
different  Governments  established  in  different  parts 
of  France  were  mostly  foreign  Governments,  that  in 
fact  the  country  had  been  conquered  before  and  was 
still  living  under  the  yoke  of  foreign  rulers.  We  can 
well  understand  that  if  in  a  country  thus  broken  to  the 
foreign  yoke  a  disturbed  state  of  affairs  supervened, 
making  mercenary  war  a  lucrative  profession,  such  a 
country  might  come  to  be  full  of  professional  soldiers 
equally  , ready  to  take  service  with  any  Government 
and  against  any  Government,  native  or  foreign. 

Now  the  condition  of  India  was  such  as  this.  The 
English  did  not  introduce  a  foreign  domination 
into  it,  for  the  foreign  domination  was  there  already. 
In  fact  we  bring  to  the  subject  a  fixed  miscon- 
ception. The  homogeneous  European  community, 
a  definite  territory  possessed  by  a  definite  race — in 
one   word,    the  Nation -State, —  though  we   assume 


Ill  HOW  WE  CONQUERED  INDIA  237 

it  as  if  it  were  a  matter  of  course,  is  in  fact  much 
more  exceptional  than  we  suppose,  and  yet  it  is 
upon  the  assumption  of  such  a  homogeneous  com- 
munity that  all  our  ideas  of  patriotism  and  public 
virtue  depend.  The  idea  of  nationality  seems  in 
India  to  be  thoroughly  confused.  The  distinction  of 
national  and  foreign  seems  to  be  lost.  Not  only  has 
a  tide  of  Mussulman  invasion  covered  the  country  ever 
since  the  eleventh  century,  but  even  if  we  go  back  to 
the  earliest  times  we  still  find  a  mixture  of  races, 
a  domination  of  race  by  race.  That  Aryan,  Sanscrit- 
speaking  race  which,  as  the  creators  of  Brahminism, 
have  given  to  India  whatever  unity  it  can  be  said  to 
have,  appear  themselves  as  invaders,  and  as  invaders 
who  have  not  succeeded  in  swallowing  up  and  absorb- 
ing the  older  nationalities.  The  older,  not  Indo- 
Germanic  race,  has  in  Europe  almost  disappeared, 
and  at  any  rate  has  left  no  trace  in  our  European 
languages,  but  in  India  the  older  stratum  is  every- 
where visible.  The  spoken  languages  there  are  not 
mere  corruptions  of  Sanscrit,  but  mixtures  of  Sanscrit 
with  older  languages  wholly  different,  and  in  the 
south  not  Sanscrit  at  all.  Brahminism  too,  which  at 
first  sight  seems  universal,  turns  out  on  examination 
to  be  a  mere  vague  eclecticism,  which  has  given  a 
show  of  imity  to  superstitions  wholly  unlike  and 
unrelated  to  each  other.  It  follows  that  in  India  the 
fundamental  postulate  cannot  be  granted,  upon  which 
the  whole  political  ethics  of  the  West  depend.  The 
homogeneous  community  does  not  exist  there,  out  of 
which  the  State  properly  so  called  arises.     Indeed  to 


238  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect 

satisfy  ourselves  of  this  it  is  not  necessary  to  travel 
so  far  back  into  the  past.  It  is  enough  to  notice  that 
since  the  time  of  Mahmoud  of  Ghazni  a  steady  stream 
of  Mussulman  invasion  has  poured  into  India.  The 
majority  of  the  Governments  of  India  were  Mussul- 
man long  before  the  arrival  of  the  Mogul  in  the 
sixteenth  century.  From  this  time  therefore  in  most 
of  the  Indian  States  the  tie  of  nationality  was  broken. 
Government  ceased  to  rest  upon  right;  the  State 
lost  its  right  to  appeal  to  patriotism. 

In  such  a  state  of  affairs  what  is  called  the  conquest 
of  India  by  the  English  can  be  explained  without 
supposing  the  natives  of  India  to  be  below  other 
races,  just  as  it  does  not  force  us  to  regard  the  English 
as  superior  to  other  races.  We  regard  it  as  the  duty 
of  a  man  to  fight  for  his  country  against  the  foreigner. 
But  what  is  a  man's  country  1  When  we  analyse  the 
notion,  we  find  it  presupposes  the  man  to  have  been 
bred  up  in  a  community  which  may  be  regarded  as  a 
great  family,  so  that  it  is  natural  for  him  to  think  of 
the  land  itself  as  a  mother.  But  if  the  community 
has  not  been  at  all  of  the  nature  of  a  family,  but  has 
been  composed  of  two  or  three  races  hating  each 
other,  if  not  the  country,  but  at  most  the  village  has 
been  regarded  as  a  home,  then  it  is  not  the  fault  of 
the  natives  of  it  that  they  have  no  patriotism  but 
village-patriotism.  It  is  one  thing  to  receive  a  foreign 
yoke  for  the  first  time,  and  quite  a  different  thing  to 
exchange  one  foreign  yoke  for  another. 

But,  as  I  have  pointed  out,  the  surprising  feature 
in  the  English  conquest  of  India  is  not  so  much  that 


Ill  HOW  WE  CONQUERED  INDIA  239 

it  should  have  been  made,  as  that  it  should  have  cost 
England  no  effort  and  no  trouble.  The  English  people 
have  not  paid  taxes,  the  English  Government  has  not 
opened  loans,  no  conscription  was  ever  introduced, 
nay,  no  drain  of  men  was  ever  perceived,  and  no 
difficulty  was  ever  felt  in  carrying  on  other  wars  at 
the  same  time,  because  we  were  engaged  in  conquer- 
ing a  population  equal  to  that  of  Europe.  This  seems 
at  first  sight  incredible,  but  I  have  already  given  the 
explanation  of  it.  As  to  the  finance  of  all  these  wars, 
it  falls  under  the  general  principle  which  applies  to 
all  wars  of  conquest.  Conquest  pays  its  own  expenses. 
As  Napoleon  had  never  any  financial  difficulties, 
because  he  lived  at  the  expense  of  those  whom  he 
vanquished  in  war,  so  the  conquest  of  India  was 
made,  as  a  matter  of  course,  at  the  expense  of  India. 
The  only  difficulty  then  is  to  understand  how  the 
army  could  be  created.  And  this  difficulty  too 
disappears,  when  we  observe  that  four-fifths  of  this 
army  was  always  composed  of  native  troops. 

If  we  fix  our  attention  upon  this  all-important  fact 
we  shall  be  led,  if  I  mistake  not,  to  perceive  that  the 
expression  "  conquest,"  as  applied  to  the  acquisition 
of  sovereignty  by  the  East  India  Company  in  India, 
is  not  merely  loose  but  thoroughly  misleading,  and 
tempts  us  to  class  the  event  among  events  which  it  in 
no  way  resembles.  I  have  indeed  remarked  more 
than  once  before  that  this  expression,  whenever  it  is 
used,  requires  far  more  definition  than  it  commonly 
receives,  and  that  it  may  bear  several  different 
meanings.     But  surely  the  word  is  only  applicable 


240  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

at  all  when  it  refers  to  some  action  done  to  one  state 
by  another.  There  is  war  between  two  states ;  the 
army  of  the  one  state  invades  the  other  and  overturns 
the  Government  of  it,  or  at  least  forces  the  Govern- 
ment to  such  humiliating  terms  that  it  is  practically 
deprived  of  its  independence ;  this  is  conquest  in  the 
proper  sense.  Now  when  we  say  that  England  has 
conquered  India,  we  ought  to  mean  that  something 
of  this  sort  has  happened  betAveen  England  and  India. 
When  Alexander  the  Great  conquered  the  Persian 
Empire,  there  was  war  between  the  Macedonian  state 
and  the  Persian,  in  which  the  latter  was  subjugated. 
When  Caesar  conquered  Gaul,  he  acted  in  the  name 
of  the  Roman  Republic,  holding  an  office  conferred 
on  him  by  the  senate,  and  commanding  the  army  of 
the  Roman  state.  But  nothing  of  this  sort  happened 
in  India.  The  King  of  England  did  not  declare  war 
upon  the  Great  Mogul  or  upon  any  Nawab  or  Rajah 
in  India.  The  English  state  would  perhaps  have  had 
no  concern  from  first  to  last  in  the  conquest  of  India 
but  for  this  circumstance,  that  it  engaged  five  times 
in  war  with  France  after  the  French  settlements  in 
India  had  become  considerable,  and  that  these  wars, 
being  partly  waged  in  India,  were  in  a  certain  degree 
mixed  up  with  the  wars  between  the  East  India 
Company  and  the  native  Powers  of  India.  If  we 
wish  clearly  to  understand  the  natiu-e  of  the  phe- 
nomenon, we  ought  to  put  this  circumstance,  which 
was  accidental,  on  one  side.  We  shall  then  see  that 
nothing  like  what  is  strictly  called  a  conquest  took 
place,  but  that  certain  traders  inhabiting  certain  sea- 


Ill  now  WE  CONQUERED  INDIA  241 

port  towns  in  India,  were  induced,  almost  forced,  in 
the  anarchy  caused  by  the  fall  of  the  Mogul  Empire, 
to  give  themselves  a  military  character  and  employ 
troops,  that  by  means  of  these  troops  they  acquired 
territory  and  at  last  almost  all  the  territory  of  India, 
and  that  these  traders  happened  to  be  Englishmen, 
and  to  employ  a  certain,  though  not  a  large,  propor- 
tion of  English  troops  in  their  army. 

Now  this  is  not  a  foreign  conquest,  but  rather  an 
internal  revolution.  In  any  country  when  government 
breaks  down  and  anarchy  sets  in,  the  general  law  is 
that  a  struggle  follows  between  such  organised  powers 
as  remain  in  the  country,  and  that  the  most  powerful 
of  these  sets  up  a  Government.  In  France  for 
instance  after  the  fall  of  the  House  of  Bourbon  in 
1792  a  new  Government  was  set  up  chiefly  through 
the  influence  of  the  Municipality  of  Paris;  this 
Government  having  fallen  into  discredit  a  few  years 
later  was  superseded  by  a  military  Government 
wielded  by  Bonaparte.  Now  India  about  1750  was 
in  a  condition  of  anarchy  caused  by  a  decay  in  the 
Mogul  Empire,  which  had  begun  at  the  death  of 
Aurungzebe  in  1707.  The  imperial  authority  having 
everywhere  lost  its  force  over  so  vast  a  territory,  the 
general  law  began  to  operate.  Everywhere  the  minor 
organised  powers  began  to  make  themselves  supreme. 
These  powers,  after  the  fashion  of  India,  were  most 
commonly  mercenary  bands  of  soldiers,  commanded 
either  by  some  provincial  governor  of  the  falling 
Empire,  or  by  some  adventurer  who  seized  an 
opportunity  of  rising  to  the  command  of  them,  or 
R 


242  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

lastly  by  some  local  power  which  had  existed  before 
the  establishment  of  the  Mogul  supremacy  and  had 
never  completely  yielded  to  it.  To  give  an  example 
of  each  kind  of  power,  the  state  of  Hyderabad  was 
founded  by  the  satrap  of  the  Great  Mogul  called  the 
Nizam,  the  state  of  Mysore  was  founded  by  the 
Mussulman  adventurer  Hyder  Ali,  who  rose  from  the 
ranks  by  mere  military  ability,  the  great  Mahratta 
confederacy  of  chieftains  headed  by  the  Peishwa,  a 
Brahminical  not  a  Mussulman  Power,  represented 
the  older  India  of  the  time  before  the  Mogul.  But 
all  these  powers  alike  subsisted  by  means  of  mercenary 
armies ;  they  lived  in  a  state  of  chronic  war  and 
mutual  plunder  such  as,  I  suppose,  has  hardly  been 
witnessed  in  Europe  except  perhaps  in  the  dissolution 
of  the  Carolingian  Empire. 

Such  a  state  of  affairs  was  peculiarly  favourable  to 
the  rise  of  new  powers.  In  other  circumstances  con- 
quest presupposes  what  I  may  call  a  capital  fund  of 
power.  No  one  can  undertake  it  that  does  not 
already  possess  a  recognised  authority  and  an  army. 
In  those  circumstances  it  was  otherwise.  Hyder  Ali 
had  nothing  but  his  head  and  his  right  arm,  and  he 
became  Sultan  of  Mysore.  For  mercenary  armies  were 
everywhere;  they  were  at  the  service  of  every  one  who 
could  pay  them  or  win  an  influence  over  them ;  and 
any  one  who  commanded  a  mercenary  army  was  on  a 
level  with  the  greatest  potentates  of  India,  since  in 
the  dissolution  of  authority  the  only  force  left  was 
military  force. 

Now  among  the  different  local  powers  in  India, 


Ill  HOW  WE  CONQUERED  INDIA  243 

which  in  such  peculiar  circumstances  might  strike  for 
empire  with  some  chance  of  success,  were  certain 
merchants  who  had  factories  in  the  seaport  towns. 
They  were  foreigners  indeed,  but,  as  I  have  pointed 
out,  this  could  make  no  difference  in  India,  where  most 
Governments  were  foreign,  Avhere  the  Great  Mogul 
himself  was  a  foreigner.  Much  rhetoric  has  been 
spent  on  the  miraculousness  of  the  fortune  of  the 
East  India  Company.  It  is  true  that  there  had  been 
no  previous  example  of  such  a  fortune,  and  that  for 
this  reason  it  would  not  have  occurred  to  any  one  to 
predict  such  a  fortune.  But  it  was  not  miraculous  in 
the  sense  of  being  hard  to  account  for  or  having 
no  visible  cause.  For  the  East  India  Company  had 
really  some  capital  to  start  with.  It  had  a  command 
of  money,  it  had  two  or  three  fortresses,  the  command 
of  the  sea,  and  it  had  the  advantage  of  being  a  cor- 
poration— that  is,  it  was  not  liable  to  be  killed  in 
battle  or  to  die  of  a  fever.  We  are  not  much 
astonished  when  an  individual  rises  from  some 
private  station  into  empire  over  a  great  territory, 
because  this  has  happened  often.  And  yet  intrinsic- 
ally it  is  much  more  astonishing.  That  the  younger 
son  of  a  poor  nobleman  in  Corsica  should  control  the 
greater  part  of  Europe  with  despotic  power,  is  in- 
trinsically far  more  wonderful  than  that  the  East 
India  Company  should  conquer  India,  for  Bonaparte 
began  without  interest,  without  friends,  without  a 
penny  in  his  pocket,  and  yet  he  not  only  gained  his 
empire  but  lost  it  again  in  less  than  twenty  years.  In 
like  manner  the  rise  of  Hyder  Ali,  or  of  Scindiah,  or 


244  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lbct. 

of  Holkar,  Avas  more  wonderful  and  demanded  more 
of  the  special  favour  of  fortune  than  the  rise  of  the 
East  India  Company.  You  see  that  I  wish  you  to 
place  this  event  in  a  different  class  of  events  from 
that  in  which  it  is  commonly  placed.  It  is  not  the 
conquest  of  one  state  by  another.  It  is  not  an  event 
in  which  two  states  are  concerned,  at  least  directly ; 
it  is  not  an  event  belonging  to  the  foreign  department. 
It  is  an  internal  revolution  in  Indian  society,  and  is 
to  be  compared  to  one  of  those  sudden  usurpations  or 
coups  d'dtat,  by  which  a  period  of  disturbance  within 
a  community  is  closed.  Let  us  imagine  for  a 
moment  that  the  merchants  who  rose  to  power  had 
not  been  foreign  at  all, — the  nature  of  the  event  is  not 
thereby  altered.  We  may  suppose  that  a  number  of 
Parsee  merchants  in  Bombay,  tired  of  the  anarchy 
which  disturbed  their  trade,  had  subscribed  together 
to  establish  fortresses  and  raise  troops,  and  then 
that  they  had  had  the  good  fortune  to  employ  able 
generals.  In  that  case  they  too  might  have  had  their 
Plassey  and  their  Buxar;  they  too  might  have  ex- 
torted from  the  Great  Mogul  the  Dewannee,  or 
financial  administration  of  a  province,  and  so  laid  the 
foundations  of  an  Empire,  which  might  in  time  have 
extended  over  all  India.  In  that  case  we  should  have 
had  substantially  the  same  event,  but  it  would  have 
appeared  clearly  in  its  true  light.  We  should  have 
recognised  it  as  having  the  nature  of  an  internal 
revolution,  as  being  the  effect  of  the  natural  struggle 
which  every  community  makes  to  put  down  the 
anarchy  which  is  tearing  it  to  pieces. 


Ill  HOW  WE  CONQUERED  INDIA  245 

In  such  an  event  as  that  there  would  have  been 
nothing  very  miraculous,  and  yet  the  rise  of  the  East 
India  Company  was  mucli  less  miraculous.  For  the 
Company  was  closely  connected  with  Europe,  and 
could  call  in  the  military  science  and  discipline  of 
Europe,  which  was  evidently  superior  to  that  of  India. 
That  same  Frenchman  Dupleix,  who  laid  down  so 
clearly  the  theory  of  the  conquest  of  India,  perceived 
that  the  native  armies  could  not  for  a  moment  stand 
before  European  troops,  but  he  perceived  also  that 
the  native  of  India  was  quite  capable  of  receiving 
European  discipline  and  learning  to  fight  with 
European  eflBciency.  This  then  was  the  talisman 
which  the  Company  possessed,  and  which  enabled 
it  not  merely  to  hold  its  own  among  the  Powers  of 
India  but  to  surpass  them, — not  some  incommunic- 
able physical  or  moral  superiority,  as  we  love  to 
imagine — but  a  superior  discipline  and  military 
system,  which  could  be  communicated  to  the  natives 
of  India. 

Beyond  this  they  had  another  great  advantage. 
They  did  not,  to  be  sure,  represent  the  English  State, 
but  yet  their  connection  with  England  was  of  infinite 
service  to  them.  They  had  indeed  to  procure  in 
the  main  for  themselves  the  money  and  the  men  by 
which  India  was  conquered.  But  as  a  chartered 
Company  which  had  the  monopoly  of  English  trade 
in  India  and  China,  they  were  an  object  of  interest 
to  the  P]nglish  Government  and  to  Parliament.  It 
several  times  happened  that  the  war  by  which  they 
acquired  Indian  territory  wore  the  appearance  before 


246  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

the  English  public  of  a  war  between  England  and 
France,  and  was  therefore  heartily  supported  by  the 
nation.  This  is  a  fact  of  fundamental  importance, 
which  has  not  often  been  sufficiently  considered. 
The  English  conquest  of  India  began  not  in  some 
quarrel  between  the  Company  and  a  native  Power. 
It  began  in  an  alarming  attempt  made  by  the  French 
to  get  control  over  the  Deccan,  and  so  among  other 
things  to  destroy  the  English  settlements  at  Madras 
and  Bombay,  by  interfering  in  the  question  of  the 
Hyderabad  succession.  Our  first  military  step  in  the 
East  was  to  defend  ourselves  against  the  French 
attack.  And  from  that  time  for  nearly  seventy  years 
—that  is,  to  the  end  of  the  war  with  Napoleon, — our 
wars  in  India  never  ceased  to  wear  more  or  less  the 
appearance  of  defensive  wars  against  France.  The 
effect  of  this  was  that,  though  they  were  not  waged 
in  the  name  or  at  the  expense  of  the  State,  yet  they 
seemed  to  a  certain  extent  national  wars, — wars  in 
which  England  was  deeply  concerned.  To  a  consider- 
able extent  therefore  the  Company's  troops  were 
aided  by  Royal  troops,  and  from  1785,  when  Lord 
Cornwallis  went  out  as  Governor-General,  an  English 
statesman  of  mark  was  sent  out  to  preside  over  the 
political  and  -military  aflfairs.  The  attacks  that  were 
made  upon  the  Company  in  Parliament,  the  vote  of 
censure  moved  against  Lord  Clive,  the  impeachment 
brought  against  Hastings,  the  successive  ministerial 
schemes  for  regulating  the  Company's  affairs,  one  of 
which  in  1783  convulsed  the  whole  political  world  of 
England,  all  these  interferences  contributed  to  make 


Ill  HOW  WE  CONQUEEED  INDIA  247 

our  Indian  wars  seem  national  wars,  and  to  identify 
the  Company  Avitli  the  EngKsh  nation.  In  this  way 
the  Company  was  practically  backed  by  the  credit  and 
renown  of  a  first-class  European  state,  though  at  the 
same  time  that  state  contributed  little  to  the  wars  by 
which  the  Company  acquired  territory. 

The  words  "  wonderful,"  "  strange,"  are  often  ap- 
plied to  great  historical  events,  and  there  is  no  event 
to  which  they  have  been  applied  more  freely  than 
to  our  conquest  of  India.  But  an  event  may  be 
wonderful  or  strange  without  being  necessarily  at  all 
difficult  to  account  for.  The  conquest  of  India  is  very 
wonderful  in  the  sense  that  nothing  similar  to  it  had 
ever  happened  before,  and  that  therefore  nothing 
similar  coiild  be  expected  by  those  who  for  the  first 
century  and  a  half  administered  the  afiairs  of  the 
Company  in  India.  No  doubt  Job  Charnock,  or 
Josiah  Child,  or  Governor  Pitt  of  Madras  (grand- 
father of  the  great  Lord  Chatham),  or  perhaps  Major 
Lawrence,  never  dreamed  that  we  should  one  day 
suppress  the  authority  alike  of  the  Peishwa  of  the 
Mahrattas  and  of  the  Great  Mogul  himself.  But  the 
event  was  not  wonderful  in  the  sense  that  it  is  diffi- 
cult to  discover  adequate  causes  by  which  it  could 
have  been  produced.  If  we  begin  by  remarking  that 
authority  in  India  had  fallen  on  the  ground  through 
the  decay  of  the  Mogul  Empire,  that  it  lay  there 
waiting  to  be  picked  up  by  somebody,  and  that  all 
over  India  in  that  period  adventurers  of  one  kind  or 
another  were  founding  Empires,  it  is  really  not  sur- 
prising that  a  mercantile  corporation  which  had  money 


248  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

to  pay  a  mercenary  force,  should  be  able  to  compete 
with  other  adventurers,  nor  yet  that  it  should  out- 
strip all  its  competitors  by  bringing  into  the  field 
English  military  science  and  generalship,  especially 
when  it  was  backed  over  and  over  again  by  the  whole 
power  and  credit  of  England  and  directed  by  English 
statesmen. 

The  sum  of  what  I  have  urged  is  that  the  conquest 
of  India  is  not  in  the  ordinary  sense  a  conquest  at  all, 
because  it  was  not  the  act  of  a  state  and  was  not 
accomplished  by  the  army  and  the  money  of  a  state. 
I  have  pointed  this  out  in  order  to  remove  the  per- 
plexity which  must  be  caused  by  the  statement  that 
England  conquered  India — that  is,  a  population  as 
large  as  that  of  Europe  and  many  thousand  miles  off,  — 
and  yet  that  England  is  not  a  military  state,  though 
this  enormous  conquest  was  achieved  by  England 
•svithout  any  exhausting  effort  and  without  any  ex- 
pense. The  explanation  of  this  contradiction  is  that 
England  did  not  in  the  strict  sense  conquer  India, 
but  that  certain  Englishmen,  who  happened  to  reside 
in  India  at  the  time  when  the  Mogul  Empire  fell,  had 
a  fortune  like  that  of  Hyder  Ali  or  Kunjeet  Singh, 
and  rose  to  supreme  power  there. 

But  yet  of  course  in  its  practical  result  the  event 
has  proved  to  be  a  conquest  of  India  by  England. 
For  now  that  the  process  is  comjflete  and  the  East 
India  Company  has  been  swept  away,  we  see  that 
Queen  Victoria  is  Empress  of  India,  and  that  a 
Secretary,  who  is  a  member  of  the  English  Cabinet 
and  sits  in  the  English  Parliament,  is  responsible  for 


m  HOW  WE  CONQUERED  INDIA  249 

the  administration  of  India.  England  as  a  state 
did  not  make  the  acquisition,  yet  it  has  fallen  to 
England.  This  is  merely  an  exemplification  of  the 
general  principle,  which,  as  I  pointed  out  above,  has 
governed  all  the  settlements  of  Europeans  outside 
Europe  since  the  time  of  Columbus.  However  far 
they  roamed,  however  strange  and  wonderful  was 
their  success,  they  were  never  able  at  the  outset  to 
shake  off  their  European  citizenship.  Cortez  and 
Pizarro  trampled  under  their  feet  the  Governments 
they  found  in  America.  With  scarcely  an  effort  they 
made  themselves  supreme  wherever  they  came.  But 
though  they  could  set  at  nought  in  Mexico  the 
authority  of  Montezuma,  they  could  not  resist  or 
dream  of  resisting  the  authority  of  Charles  V.,  who 
was  on  the  other  side  of  the  Atlantic.  The  conse- 
quence was  that  whatever  conquests  they  made  by 
their  own  unassisted  audacity  and  effort  were  con- 
fiscated at  once  and  as  a  matter  of  course  by  Spain. 
So  with  the  English  in  India.  After  1765  the  East 
India  Company  held  nominally  a  high  office  in  the 
Empire  of  the  Great  Mogul.  But  it  was  asserted  at 
once  by  the  English  Parliament  that  whatever  terri- 
torial acquisitions  might  be  made  by  the  Company 
were  under  the  control  of  Parliament.  The  Great 
Mogul's  name  was  scarcely  mentioned  in  the  discus- 
sion, and  the  question  seems  never  to  have  been 
raised  whether  he  would  consent  to  the  administra- 
tion of  his  provinces  of  Bengal,  Behar,  and  Orissa 
being  thus  conducted  under  the  control  of  a  foreign 
Government.     The  Company  made  part  of  two  states 


250  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect.  ill 

at  once.  It  was  a  Company  under  a  Charter  from 
the  King  of  England;  it  was  a  Dewan  under  the 
Great  Mogul.  But  it  swept  away  the  Great  Mogul, 
as  Cortez  swept  away  Montezuma ;  on  the  other 
hand  it  submitted  all  its  boundless  acquisitions 
meekly  to  the  control  of  England,  and  at  last,  when 
a  century  was  completed  from  the  battle  of  Plassey, 
it  suffered  itself  to  be  abolished  and  surrendered 
India  to  the  English  Government. 


LECTURE  IV 

HOW  WE  GOVERN   INDIA 

I  HAVE  considered  the  nature  of  the  relation  in  which 
India  stands  to  England,  and  have  tried  to  explain 
how  this  relation  could  spring  up  without  a  miracle. 
We  may  now  advance  a  step  and  form  some  opinion 
on  the  question  whether  that  relation  can  endure 
without  a  miracle,  as  it  was  created  without  one,  or 
whether  we  ought  to  regard  the  government  of  India 
by  the  English  as  a  kind  of  political  tmr  de  force,  a 
matter  of  astonishment  while  it  lasts,  but  certain  not 
to  last  very  long.  For  the  great  difficulty  which  the 
student  has  to  contend  Avith  in  studying  Indian 
affairs  is  the  dazzling  effect  of  events  so  strange,  so 
remote,  and  on  a  scale  so  large,  by  which  he  is  led  to 
think  that  ordinary  causation  is  not  to  be  expected 
in  India,  and  that  in  that  region  all  is  miraculous. 
The  rhetorical  tone  ordinarily  adopted  in  history 
favours  this  illusion ;  historians  are  fond  of  parading 
all  the  strange  and  marvellous  features  of  the  Indian 
Empire,  as  if  it  were  less  their  business  to  account 


252  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LBCT. 

for  what  happens  than  to  make  it  seem  more  un- 
accountable than  before. 

Thus  Ave  come  to  think  of  our  ascendency  in  India 
as  an  exception  to  all  ordinary  rules,  a  standing 
miracle  in  politics,  onlj^  to  be  explained  by  the  heroic 
qualities  of  the  English  race  and  their  natural  genius 
for  government.  So  long  as  we  take  this  view,  it  is 
of  course  impossible  for  us  to  form  any  opinion 
concerning  the  duration  of  it.  What  was  a  miracle 
at  the  beginning  is  likely  to  continue  so  to  the  end. 
If  ordinary  laws  are  suspended,  who  shall  say  how 
long  the  suspension  is  likely  to  last  ?  Now  I  have 
tried  to  look  calmly  at  our  Empire  in  its  beginning. 
I  have  examined  the  conquest  of  India,  and  have 
found  that  it  is  indeed  miraculous  in  the  sense  of 
being  unlike  our  experience  —  the  revolutions  of 
Asiatic  society  would  naturally  be  unlike  those  of 
Europe — but  that  it  is  not  miracidous  in  the  sense  of 
being  unaccountable,  or  even  difficult  to  account  for. 
I  now  inquire  whether  our  government  of  India  is 
miraculous  in  this  sense. 

It  must  certainly  appear  so,  if  we  assume  that 
India  is  simply  a  conquered  country  and  the  English 
its  conquerors.  Who  does  not  know  the  extreme 
difficulty  of  repressing  the  disaffection  of  a  conquered 
population  ?  Over  and  over  again  it  has  been  found 
impossible,  even  where  the  superiority  both  in ,  the 
number  and  efficiency  of  troops  has  been  decidedly 
on  the  side  of  the  conquerors.  When  the  Spaniards 
failed  in  the  Low  Countries,  they  were  the  best 
soldiers  and   Spain   by   far   the    greatest    state    in 


IV  HOW  WE  GOVERN  INDIA  253 

Christendom.  For  the  instinct  of  nationality  or  of 
separate  religion  mere  than  supplies  the  place  of 
valour  or  of  discipline,  being  diffused  through  the 
whole  population  and  not  confined  to  the  fighting 
part  of  it.  Let  us  compare  the  parallel  case  of  Italy. 
Italy  corresponds  in  the  map  of  Europe  to  India  in 
that  of  Asia.  It  is  a  similar  peninsula  at  the  south 
of  the  Continent,  with  a  mighty  mountain  range 
above  it,  and  below  this  a  great  river  flowing  from 
west  to  east.  It  is  still  more  similar  in  the  circum- 
stance that  for  many  centuries  it  was  a  prey  to 
foreign  invaders.  No  long  time  ago  Italy  was  sub- 
ject to  the  ascendency  and  partly  to  the  actual  rule 
of  Austria.  Its  inhabitants  were  less  warlike,  its 
armies  much  less  efficient,  than  those  of  Austria,  and 
Austria  was  close  at  hand.  And  yet,  though  fighting 
at  so  much  disadvantage,  Italy  has  made  herself 
free.  In  the  field  she  was  generally  defeated,  but 
the  feeling  of  nationality  was  so  strong  within  and 
attracted  so  much  sympathy  without,  that  she  has 
had  her  way,  and  the  foreigner  has  left  her  to  her- 
self. Now  in  every  point  India  is  more  advan- 
tageously situated  with  respect  to  England  than  Italy 
with  respect  to  Austria.  She  has  a  population  about 
eight  times  as  great  as  that  of  England  ;  she  is  at  the 
other  side  of  the  globe ;  and  then  England  does  not 
profess  to  be  a  military  state.  Yet  to  all  appearance 
she  submits  to  the  yoke ;  we  do  not  hear  of  rebellions. 
In  conducting  the  government  of  India  we  meet  with 
difficulties,  l)ut  tliey  are  chiefly  financial  and  econo- 
mical.    The  particular  difficulty  which  in  Italy  was 


254  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

too  much  for  Austria  we  do  not  encounter ;  we  do 
not  feel  the  difficulty  of  repressing  the  disaffection  of 
a  conquered  nationality.  Is  not  this  miraculous? 
Does  it  not  seem  as  if  all  ordinary  laws  were  sus- 
pended in  this  case,  or  as  if  we  might  assume  that 
there  are  no  bounds  either  to  the  submissiveness  of 
the  Hindu  or  to  the  genius  for  government  of  the 
English  ? 

What  I  urged  above  may  partly  prepare  you  for 
the  answer  which  I  make  to  this  question.  In  the 
question  it  is  assumed,  first,  that  India  constitutes  a 
nationality ;  secondly,  that  this  nationality  has  been 
conquered  by  England.  Now  both  these  assumptions 
are  wholly  unfounded. 

First  the  notion  that  India  is  a  nationality  rests 
upon  that  vulgar  error  which  political  science 
principally  aims  at  eradicating.  We  in  Europe, 
accustomed  to  see  the  map  of  Europe  divided  into 
countries  each  of  which  is  assigned  to  a  peculiar 
nationality,  of  which  a  special  language  is  the  badge, 
fall  into  a  profound  misconception.  We  assume  that 
wherever,  inside  or  outside  of  Europe,  there  is  a 
country  which  has  a  name,  there  must  be  a  nationality 
answering  to  it.  At  the  same  time  we  take  no  pains 
to  conceive  clearly  or  define  precisely  what  we  call  a 
nationality.  We  content  ourselves  with  remarking 
that  we  in  England  should  be  most  unwilling  to  be 
governed  by  the  French,  and  that  the  French  would 
be  sorry  to  be  governed  by  the  Germans,  and  from 
these  examples  we  draw  the  conclusion  that  the 
people  of  India  must  in  like  manner  feel  it  a  deep 


IV  HOW  WE  GOVERN  INDIA  255 

humiliation  to  be  governed  by  the  English.  Such 
notions  spring  from  mere  idleness  and  inattention. 
It  does  not  need  proving,  it  is  sufficient  merely  to 
state,  that  it  is  not  every  population  which  constitutes 
a  nationality.  The  English  and  the  French  are  not 
mere  populations ;  they  are  populations  united  in  a 
very  special  way  and  by  very  special  forces.  Let 
us  think  of  some  of  these  uniting  forces,  and  then  ask 
whether  they  operate  upon  the  populations  of  India. 
The  first  is  community  of  race,  or  rather  the  belief 
in  a  community  of  race.  This,  when  it  appears  on  a 
large  scale,  is  identical  with  community  of  language. 
The  English  are  those  who  speak  English,  the  French 
those  who  speak  French.  Now  do  the  inhabitants  of 
India  speak  one  language  1  The  answer  is.  No  more, 
but  rather  less,  than  the  inhabitants  of  Europe  speak 
one  language  !  So  much  has  been  said  by  philologers 
about  Sanscrit  and  its  affinities  with  other  languages, 
that  it  is  necessary  to  remark  that  it  is  an  obvious 
community  of  language,  of  which  the  test  is  intelligi- 
bility, and  not  some  hidden  affinity,  that  acts  as  a 
uniting  force.  Thus  the  Italians  regarded  the  Aus- 
trians  as  foreigners  because  they  could  not  under- 
stand German,  without  troubling  themselves  to 
consider  that  German  as  well  as  Italian  is  an  Indo- 
European  language.  There  is  affinity  among  several 
of  the  languages  of  India,  as  among  those  of  Europe. 
The  Hindi  languages  may  be  compared  witli  the 
Romance  languages  of  Europe,  as  being  descendants  of 
the  ancient  language,  but  the  mutual  affinity  of  the 
Bengali,  the  Marathi,  the  Guzerati  does  not  help  to 


256  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

make  those  who  speak  them  one  nation.  The 
Hindustani  has  sprung  out  of  the  Mussulman 
conquest,  by  a  mixture  of  the  Persian  of  the  invaders 
with  the  Hindi  languages  of  the  natives.  But  in  the 
South  we  find  a  linguistic  discrepancy  in  India 
greater  than  any  which  exists  in  Europe,  for  the 
great  languages  of  the  South,  Tamil,  Telugu, 
Canarese,  are  not  Indo-European  at  all,  and  they  are 
spoken  by  populations  far  larger  than  those  Finns 
and  Magyars  of  Europe  whose  language  is  not  Indo- 
European. 

This  fact  is  enough  by  itself  to  show  that  the 
name  India  ought  not  to  be  classed  with  such  names 
as  England  or  France,  which  correspond  to  nation- 
alities, but  rather  with  such  as  Europe,  marking  a 
group  of  nationalities  which  have  chanced  to  obtain  a 
common  name  owing  to  some  physical  separation. 
Like  Europe  it  is  a  mere  geogra})hic  expression,  but 
even  so,  it  has  been  much  less  uniformly  used  than 
the  na«ie  Europe.  Europe  at  any  rate  has  been 
used  in  much  the  same  sense  since  the  time  of 
Herodotus,  but  our  present  use  of  the  word  India  is 
not  perhaps  very  old.  To  us  indeed  it  seems  natural 
that  the  whole  country  which  is  marked  off  from 
Asia  by  the  great  barrier  of  the  Himalaya  and  the 
Suleiman  range  should  have  a  single  name.  But  it 
has  not  always  seemed  so.  The  Greeks  had  but  a 
very  vague  idea  of  this  country.  To  them  for  a  long 
time  the  word  India  was  for  practical  purposes  what 
it  was  etymologically,  the  province  of  the  Indus. 
When  they  say  that  Alexander  invaded  India,  they 


IV  HOW  WE  GOVERN  INDIA  257 

refer  to  the  Punjab.  At  a  later  time  they  obtained 
some  information  about  the  valley  of  the  Ganges, 
but  little  or  none  about  the  Deccan.  Meanwhile  in 
India  itself  it  did  not  seem  so  natural  as  it  seems  to 
us  to  give  one  name  to  the  whole  region.  For  there 
is  a  very  marked  difference  between  the  northern  and 
southern  parts  of  it.  The  great  Aryan  community 
which  spoke  Sanscrit  and  invented  Brahminism 
spread  itself  chiefly  from  the  Punjab  along  the  great 
valley  of  the  Ganges,  but  not  at  first  far  southward. 
Accordingly  the  name  Hindostan  properly  belongs  to 
this  Northern  region.  In  the  South  or  peninsula  we 
find  other  races  and  non-Aryan  languages,  though 
Brahminism  has  extended  itself  there  too.  Even  the 
Mogul  Empire  in  its  best  time  did  not  much  penetrate 
into  this  region. 

It  appears  then  that  India  is  not  a  political  name, 
but  only  a  geographical  expression  like  Europe  or 
Africa.  It  does  not  mark  the  territory  of  a  nation 
and  a  language,  but  the  territory  of  many  *hations 
and  many  languages.  Here  is  the  fundamental 
difference  between  India  and  such  countries  as  Italy, 
in  which  the  principle  of  nationality  has  asserted 
itself.  Both  India  and  Italy  were  divided  among  a 
number  of  states,  and  so  were  weak  in  resistance  to 
the  foreigner.  But  Italy,  though  divided  by  organ- 
isation, was  one  by  nationality.  The  same  language 
pervaded  it,  and  out  of  this  language  had  sprung  a 
great  literature,  which  was  the  common  possession  of 
the  whole  peninsula.  India,  as  I  have  pointed  out, 
is  no  more  united  by  language  than  Europe  is. 
S 


258  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LBOT. 

But  nationality  is  compounded  of  several  elements, 
of  which  a  sense  of  kindred  is  only  one.  The  sense 
of  a  common  interest  and  the  habit  of  forming  a 
single  political  whole  constitute  another  element. 
This  too  has  been  very  weak,  though  perhaps  it  has 
not  been  altogether  wanting  in  India.  The  country 
might  seem  almost  too  large  for  it,  but  the  barrier 
which  separates  India  from  the  rest  of  the  world  is  so 
much  more  effective  than  any  barrier  between  one 
part  of  India  than  another,  that  in  spite  of  all 
ethnical  and  local  divisions  some  vague  conception  of 
India  as  at  least  a  possible  whole  has  existed  from 
a  very  ancient  time.  In  the  shadowy  traditionary 
history  of  the  times  before  Mahmoud  of  Ghazni  it  is 
vaguely  related  of  this  king  and  that  king  that  he 
was  lord  of  all  India ;  the  dominion  of  some  historical 
princes  in  the  first  Mohammedan  period,  and  finally 
the  Mogul  Empire,  were  approximately  universal. 
But  we  must  not  exaggerate  the  greatness  of  the 
Mogul  Empire,  or  imagine  that  it  answers  in  India 
to  the  Eoman  Empire  in  Europe.  Observe  how  short 
its  duration  was.  We  cannot  put  the  very  com- 
mencement of  it  earlier  than  1524,  the  date  of  the 
capture  of  Lahore  by  Baber — that  is,  in  Henry  VIII. 's 
reign.  When  Vasco  da  Gama  landed  in  India  it  had 
not  begun  to  exist,  and  its  marked  and  rapid  decline 
begins  in  1707 — that  is,  in  Queen  Anne's  reign. 
Between  these  dates  there  is  less  than  two  centuries. 
But  next  observe  that  the  Mogul  Empire  cannot  be 
properly  said  to  have  existed  from  the  moment  when 
Baber  entered  India,  but  only  from  the  moment  wheo 


rv  HOW  WE  GOVERN  INDIA  259 

the  Indian  dominion  of  the  Moguls  became  extensive. 
Now  at  the  accession  of  Akber,  which  was  in  1559, 
or  the  year  after  that  of  Queen  Elizabeth,  this  Empire 
consisted  simply  of  the  Punjab  and  the  country 
round  Delhi  and  Agra.  It  was  not  till  1576  that 
Akber  conquered  Bengal,  and  he  conquered  Sind  and 
Guzerat  between  1591  and  1594.  His  empire  was 
now  extensive,  but  if  we  consider  1594  instead  of 
1524  as  the  date  of  the  commencement  of  the  Mogul 
Empire,  we  reduce  its  duration  to  little  more  than  a 
century. 

Next  observe  that  even  at  this  time  it  by  no 
means  includes  all  India.  To  imagine  this  is  to  con- 
fuse India  with  Hindostan.  Akber's  dominion  in 
1595  was  limited  by  the  Nerbudda,  and  he  had  not 
yet  set  foot  in  the  Deccan.  He  was  Emperor  of 
Hindostan,  but  by  no  means  of  India.  In  his  later 
years  he  invaded  the  Deccan,  and  from  this  time  the 
Mogul  pretensions  began  to  extend  to  the  Southern 
half  of  India.  But  it  cannot  be  said  that  anything 
like  a  conquest  of  the  Deccan  was  made  before  the 
great  expedition  of  Aurungzebe  in  1683.  From  this 
time  we  may,  if  we  choose,  speak  of  the  Mogul 
Empire  as  including  the  Deccan,  and  therefore  as 
uniting  all  India  under  one  Government,  though  the 
subjection  of  the  Deccan  was  chiefly  nominal,  for  the 
Mahratta  Power  was  already  rising  fast.  But  thus 
the  duration  of  the  Empire  is  reduced  to  a  mere 
moment,  for  the  Mogul  Emperors  purchased  this  ex- 
tension of  their  dominion  by  the  ruin  of  the  Empire. 
Within  twenty-four  years  decay  had  become  visible. 


'260  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LBOT. 

and,  as  I  take  it,  directly  in  consequence  of  this  am- 
bitious expedition.  The  Empire  had  always  wanted 
a  sufficient  nucleus,  and  its  powers  were  exhausted 
by  this  unwise  attempt  to  extend  it. 

On  the  whole  then  it  may  be  said  that  India  has 
never  really  been  united  so  as  to  form  one  state  ex- 
cept under  the  English.  And  they  cannot  be  said  to 
have  accomplished  the  work  until  the  Governor- 
Generalship  of  Lord  Dalhousie  thirty  years  ago, 
when  the  Punjab,  Oude,  and  Nagpore  were  incor- 
porated with  the  English  dominions. 

Another  leading  element  of  nationality  is  a  com- 
mon religion.  This  element  is  certainly  not  altogether 
wanting  in  India.  The  Brahminical  system  does 
extend  over  the  whole  of  India.  Not  of  course  that 
it  is  the  only  religion  of  India.  There  are  not  less 
than  fifty  millions  of  Mussulmans — that  is,  a  far 
greater  number  than  is  to  be  found  in  the  Turkish 
Empire.  There  is  also  a  small  number  of  Sikhs,  who 
profess  a  religion  which  is  a  sort  of  fusion  of 
Mohammedanism  and  Brahminism ;  there  are  a  few 
Christians,  and  in  Ceylon  and  Nepaul  there  are 
Buddhists.  But  Brahminism  remains  the  creed  of 
the  enormous  majority,  and  it  has  so  much  real 
vitality  that  it  has  more  than  once  resisted  formidable 
attacks.  One  of  the  most  powerful  of  all  proselytis- 
ing creeds,  Buddhism,  sprang  up  in  India  itself;  it 
spread  far  and  wide;  we  have  evidence  that  it 
flourished  with  vigour  in  India  two  centuries  before 
Christ,  and  that  it  was  still  flourishing  in  the  seventh 
century  after  Christ.     Yet  it  has  been  conquered  by 


vr  HOW  WE  GOVERN  INDIA  261 

Brahminism,  and  flourishes  now  almost  in  every  part 
of  Asia  more  than  in  the  country  which  produced  it. 
After  this  victory  Brahminism  had  to  resist  the 
assault  of  another  powerful  aggressive  religion,  before 
which  Zoroastrianism  had  already  fallen,  and  even 
Christianity  had  in  the  East  had  to  retreat  some 
steps,  Mohammedanism.  Here  again  it  held  its  own ; 
Mussulman  Governments  overspread  India,  but  they 
could  not  convert  the  people. 

Now  religion  seems  to  me  to  be  the  strongest  and 
most  important  of  all  the  elements  which  go  to 
constitute  nationality;  and  this  element  exists  in 
India  When  it  is  said  that  India  is  to  be  compared 
rather  to  Europe  than  to  France  or  England,  we  may 
remember  that  Europe,  considered  as  Christendom, 
has  had  and  still  has  a  certain  unity,  which  would 
show  itself  plainly  and  quickly  enough  if  Europe 
were  threatened,  as  more  than  once  it  was  threatened 
in  the  Middle  Ages,  by  a  barbarian  and  heathen 
enemy.  It  may  seem  then  that  in  Brahminism 
India  has  a  germ,  out  of  which  sooner  or  later  an 
•Indian  nationality  might  spring.  And  perhaps  it  is 
so ;  but  yet  we  are  to  observe  that  in  that  case  the 
nationality  ought  to  have  developed  itself  long  since. 
For  the  Mussulman  invasions,  which  have  succeeded 
each  other  through  so  many  centuries,  have  supplied 
precisely  the  pressure  which  was  most  likely  to 
favour  the  development  of  the  germ.  Why  did 
Brahminism  content  itself  with  holding  its  own 
against  Islam,  and  not  rouse  and  unite  India  against 
the  invader?    It  never  did  so.     Brahminical  Powers 


262  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

have  risen  in  India.  A  chieftain  named  Sivaji  arose 
in  the  middle  of  the  seventeenth  century,  and 
possessing  himself  of  one  or  two  hill-forts  in  the 
highlands  behind  Bombay,  founded  the  Mahratta 
Power.  This  was  a  truly  Hindu  organisation,  and, 
as  its  power  increased,  it  fell  more  and  more  under 
the  control  of  the  Brahmin  caste.  The  decline  of 
the  Mogul  Empire  favoured  its  advance,  so  that  in 
the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century  the  ramifications 
of  the  Mahratta  confederacy  covered  almost  the  whole 
of  India.  It  might  appear  that  in  this  confederacy 
there  lay  the  nucleus  of  an  Indian  nationality,  that 
Brahminism  was  now  about  to  do  for  the  Hindus 
what  has  been  done  for  so  many  other  races  by  their 
religion.  But  nothing  of  the  kind  happened.  Brah- 
minism did  not  pass  into  patriotism.  Perhaps  its 
facile  comprehensiveness,  making  it  in  reality  not  a 
religion  but  only  a  loose  compromise  between  several 
religions,  has  enfeebled  it  as  a  uniting  principle.  At 
any  rate  it  appears  that  in  the  Mahratta  movement 
there  never  was  anything  elevated  or  patriotic,  but 
that  it  continued  from  first  to  last  to  be  an  organisa- 
tion of  plunder. 

There  is  then  no  Indian  nationality,  though  there 
are  some  germs  out  of  which  we  can  conceive  an 
Indian  nationality  developing  itself.  It  is  this  fact, 
and  not  some  enormous  superiority  on  the  part  of 
the  English  race,  that  makes  our  Empire  in  India 
possible.  If  there  could  arise  in  India  a  nationality- 
movement  similar  to  that  which  we  witnessed  in 
Italy,  the  English  Power  could  not  even  make  the 


IV  HOW  WE  GOVERN  INDIA  263 

resistance  that  was  made  in  Italy  by  Austria,  but 
must  succumb  at  once.  For  what  means  can  England 
have,  which  is  not  even  a  military  state,  of  resisting 
the  rebellion  of  two  hundred  and  fifty  millions  of 
subjects  ?  Do  you  say,  as  we  conquered  them  before, 
we  could  conquer  them  again  1  But  I  explained  that 
we  did  not  conquer  them.  I  showed  you  that  of  the 
army  which  won  our  victories  four-fifths  consisted  of 
native  troops.  That  we  were  able  to  hire  these 
native  troops  for  service  in  India,  was  due  to  the  fact 
that  the  feeling  of  nationality  had  no  existence  there. 
Now  if  the  feeling  of  a  common  nationality  began  to 
exist  there  only  feebly, — if,  without  inspiring  any 
active  desire  to  drive  out  the  foreigner,  it  only 
created  a  notion  that  it  was  shameful  to  assist  him  in 
maintaining  his  dominion, — from  that  day  almost  our 
Empire  would  cease  to  exist;  for  of  the  army  by 
which  it  is  garrisoned  two-thirds  consist  of  native 
soldiers.  Imagine  what  an  easy  task  the  Italian 
patriots  would  have  had  before  them,  if  the  Austrian 
Government  which  they  desired  to  expel  had  de- 
pended not  upon  Austrian  but  upon  Italian  soldiers ! 
Let  us  suppose — not  even  that  the  native  army 
mutinied — but  simply  that  a  native  army  could  not 
any  longer  be  levied.  In  a  moment  the  impossibility 
of  holding  India  would  become  manifest  to  us  ;  for 
it  is  a  condition  of  our  Indian  Empire  that  it  should 
be  held  without  any  great  effort.  As  it  was  acquired 
without  much  effort  on  the  part  of  the  English  state, 
it  must  be  retained  in  the  same  way.  We  are  not 
prepared   to  bury  millions  upon   millions  or  army 


264  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

upon  army  in  defending  our  acquisition.  The 
moment  India  began  really  to  show  herself  what  we 
so  idly  imagine  her  to  be,  a  conquered  nation,  that 
moment  we  should  recognise  perforce  the  impossi- 
bility of  retaining  her. 

And  thus  the  mystic  halo  of  marvel  and  miracle 
which  has  gathered   round   this   Empire  disappears 
before   a   fixed   scrutiny.      It  disappears   when   we 
perceive  that,  though  we  are  foreign  rulers  in  India, 
we  are  not  conquerors  resting  on  superior  force,  when 
we  recognise  that  it  is  a  mere  European  prejudice 
to  assume  that  since  we  do   not   rule   by  the  will 
of  the  people  of  India,  we  must  needs  rule  against 
their  will.      The  love  of  independence  presupposes 
political   consciousness.     Where   this   is  wanting,  a 
foreign  Government  will  be  regarded  passively,  and 
such  a  Government  may  continue  for  a  long  time  and 
prosper   without    exerting  any   extraordinary   skill. 
Such  a  passive  feeling  towards  Government  becomes 
inveterate  in  a  country  that  has  been  frequently  con- 
quered.    Governments   most   oppressive  have  often 
continued  for  centuries,  and  that  though  they  had  no 
means  of  resisting  rebellion  if  it  should  arise,  simply 
because  it  did  not  enter  into  the  habits  of  the  people 
to  rebel,  because  they  were  accustomed  to  obedience. 
Read  the  history  of  the  Russian  Czars  in  the  sixteenth 
century.     Why  did  a  great  population  submit  to  the 
furious  caprices  of  Ivan  the  Terrible  '\    The  answer 
is  plain.     They  had  been  trampled  under  foot  for  two 
centuries  by  the  Tartars,  and  during  that  period  they 
had  acquired  the  habit  of  passive  submission. 


VT  HOW  WE  GOVERN  INDIA  265 

Now  ought  we  not  to  expect  the  population  of 
India  to  be  in  a  similar  condition  of  feeling?  Of 
liberty,  of  popular  institutions,  there  exists  scarcely 
a  trace  in  the  whole  extent  of  Indian  history  or 
tradition.  The  Italians  had  the  Eoman  Republic 
behind  them,  and  it  was  by  reading  Livy  to  the 
people  that  Ribnzi  roused  them  to  rebellion.  No 
Indian  demagogue  could  find  anything  similar  to  read 
to  the  people.  And  for  seven  hundred  years  when 
the  English  arrived,  thej^  had  been  governed  not 
only  by  despots  but  by  foreign  despots.  It  would  be 
marvellous  indeed  if  in  such  a  country  the  feeling 
could  have  sprung  up  that  Government  exists  for 
and  depends  on  the  people,  if  a  habit  of  criticis- 
ing Government,  of  meditating  its  overthrow,  or  of 
organising  opposition  against  it,  could  have  sprung  up. 
Nations  have,  as  it  were,  very  stiff  joints.  They  do 
not  easily  learn  a  new  kind  of  movement ;  they  do 
what  their  fathers  did,  even  when  they  fancy  them- 
selves most  original.  It  has  been  pointed  out  that 
even  the  French  Revolution  strangely  resembled  some 
earlier  chapters  in  the  history  of  France.  Certainly 
the  Italian  nationality-movement  resembles  earlier 
Italian  movements  that  go  back  beyond  the  age  of 
Dante.  Now  by  this  rule  we  should  expect  to  find 
the  Indian  population  silently  submitting  to  whatever 
Government  had  the  possession  of  power,  even  though 
it  were  foreign,  as  our  Government  is,  and  even 
though  it  were  savagely  oppressive,  which  we  think 
our  Government  is  not. 

Our  Government  of  India  would  be  a  miracle  on 


266  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

two  conditions.  First,  if  the  Hindus  had  been  accus- 
tomed to  be  ruled  only  by  their  own  countrymen, 
and  were  familiar  with  the  idea  of  resisting  authority. 
This  is  not  the  case  of  the  Hindus,  and  accordingly 
they  submit,  as  throughout  history  vast  populations 
have  been  in  the  habit  of  submitting  to  Governments 
which  they  could  easily  overthrow,  as  the  Chinese  at 
the  present  day  submit  to  a  Tartar  domination,  as 
the  Hindus  themselves  submitted  to  the  Mogul 
domination  before  the  English  came.  Indeed  this 
example  of  the  Moguls  is  well  adapted  to  show  that 
our  ascendency  over  the  Hindus  is  no  proof  of  any 
supernatural  statesmanship  in  us.  For  one  cannot 
read  the  Mogul  history  without  being  struck  with 
the  very  same  fact  which  surprises  us  in  the  history 
of  the  English  rule,  viz.  that  the  Moguls  too  con- 
quered almost  without  apparent  means.  Baber,  the 
founder  of  the  Empire,  did  not  come  with  a  mighty 
nation  at  his  back,  or  leaning  on  the  organisation  of 
some  powerful  state.  He  had  inherited  a  small 
Tartar  kingdom  in  Central  Asia,  but  he  had  lost  this 
by  an  invasion  of  Osbegs.  He  wandered  for  a  while 
as  a  homeless  adventurer,  and  then  got  possession  of 
another  small  kingdom  in  Afghanistan.  Nothing 
could  be  slighter  than  this  first  germ  of  empire. 
This  Tartar  adventurer  ruling  Afghans  in  Cabul 
founded  an  Empire  which  in  about  seventy  years 
extended  over  half  India,  and  in  a  hundred  years 
more  extended  nominally  at  least  over  the  whole. 
I  do  not  say  that  the  Mogul  Empire  was  ever 
comparable  for  greatness  or  solidity  to  that  which  we 


IV  HOW  WE  GOVERN  INDIA  267 

have  established,  but  like  our  own,  even  more  than 
our  own,  it  seems  built  up  without  hands.  The 
Company  had  at  least  English  money,  English  military 
science,  and  the  immortality  of  a  corporation.  Baber 
and  his  successors  had  none  of  these  resources.  It  is 
difficult  to  discover  any  causes  which  favoured  the 
growth  of  their  Empire.  All  we  can  say  is  that 
Central  Asia  swarmed  with  a  wandering  population 
much  inclined  to  the  vocation  of  mercenary  soldiers, 
which  passed  very  readily  for  pay  and  plunder  into 
the  service  of  the  ruler  of  Cabul. 

Secondly,  our  rule  would  be  wonderful  if  the  two 
hundred  million  Hindus  had  the  habit  of  thinking  all 
together,  like  a  single  nation.  If  not,  there  is  nothing 
wonderful  in  it.  A  mere  mass  of  individuals,  uncon- 
nected with  each  other  by  any  common  feelings  or 
interests,  is  easily  subjected,  because  they  may  be 
induced  to  act  against  each  other.  Now  I  have 
pointed  out  how  weak  and  insufficient  are  the  bonds 
which  unite  the  Hindus.  If  you  wish  to  see  how 
this  want  of  internal  union  has  operated  in  favour  of 
our  rule,  you  have  only  to  read  the  history  of  the 
great  Mutiny.  It  may  have  occurred  to  you  when  I 
said  that  a  mutiny  or  even  less  than  a  mutiny  on  the 
part  of  our  native  troops  would  be  instantly  fatal  to 
our  Empire,  that  just  such  a  mutiny  actually  happened 
in  1857,  and  yet  that  our  Empire  still  flourishes. 
But  you  are  to  observe  that  I  spoke  of  a  mutiny 
caused  by  a  nationality-movement  spreading  among 
the  people  and  at  last  gaining  the  army.  The  mutiny 
of  1857  was  not  of  this  kind.     It  began  in  the  army 


268  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LEOT. 

and  was  regarded  passively  by  the  people ;  it  was 
provoked  by  definite  military  grievances,  and  not  by 
any  disafi"ection  caused  by  the  feeling  of  nationality 
against  our  Government  as  foreign.  But  now  let  us 
ask ;  in  what  way  was  this  mutiny,  when  once  it  had 
broken  out,  put  down  1  I  am  afraid  the  only  opinion 
that  has  ever  obtained  in  England  has  been  that  it 
was  crushed  by  the  prodigious  heroism  of  the  English 
and  their  infinite  superiority  to  the  Hindus.  Let  me 
read  you  the  account  which  Colonel  Chesney  gives  of 
the  matter  in  his  Indian  Polity,  After  remarking 
that  an  intensely  strong  espit  de  corps  had  sprung  up 
in  the  Bengal  Army — for  observe  that  the  Bombay 
and  Madras  armies  were  very  slightly  concerned  in  the 
mutiny — an  esprit  de  corps  which  was  purely  military 
and  actually  opposed  to  the  feeling  of  nationality, 
since  it  welded  together  the  Hindu  and  the  Mussul- 
man elements  (so  that  Colonel  Chesney  remarks  :  "  In 
ill-discipline,  bitterness  of  feeling  against  their  masters, 
and  confidence  in  their  power  to  overthrow  them, 
there  was  nothing  to  choose  between  Hindu  or 
Mussulman "),  he  goes  on  to  point  out  by  what 
counter-movement  this  movement  was  met.  "For- 
tunately the  so-called  Bengal  Presidency  was  not 
garrisoned  wholly  by  the  regular  army.  Four 
battalions  of  Goorkhas,  inhabitants  of  the  Nepalese 
Himalaya,  who  had  been  kept  aloof  from  the  rest  of 
the  army,  and  had  not  imbibed  the  class-feeling  which 
animated  that  body,  with  one  exception  stood  loyal ; 
the  conspicuous  gallantry  and  devotedness  to  the 
British  cause  displayed  by  one  of  these  regiments 


IV  HOW  WE  GOVERN  INDIA  269 

especially  won  the  admiration  of  their  English  com- 
rades. Two  extra-regiments  of  the  line,  which  had 
been  recruited  from  the  Punjab  and  its  neighbourhood, 
also  stood  firm.  But  the  great  help  came  from  the 
Punjab  Irregular  Force,  as  it  was  termed — a  force, 
however,  which  was  organised  on  quite  as  methodical 
and  regular  a  footing,  was  quite  as  well-drilled  and 
vastly  better  disciplined,  than  the  regular  army. 
This  force  consisted  of  six  regiments  of  infantry  and 
five  of  cavalry,  to  which  may  be  added  four  regiments 
of  Sikh  local  infantry,  usually  stationed  in  the  Punjab. 
These  troops  were  directly  under  the  orders  of  the 
Government  of  that  province,  and  not  subject  to  that 
centralised  system  of  administration  which  had  a 
share  in  undermining  the  discipline  of  the  regular 
army.  It  was  with  these  troops  and  the  handful  of 
Europeans  quartered  in  the  upper  part  of  India  that 
the  rebellion  was  first  met.  Meanwhile  the  sympathies 
of  the  people  of  the  Punjab  were  enlisted  on  behalf 
of  their  rulers.  A  lately-conquered  people,  whose 
accustomed  occupation  had  been  superseded  by  the 
disbandment  of  their  army,  they  entertained  no  good- 
will to  the  Hindustani  garrisons  which  occupied  their 
country,  and  welcomed  with  alacrity  the  appeal  to 
arms  made  them  to  join  in  the  overthrow  of  their 
hereditary  enemies.  Any  number  of  men  that  could 
be  required  was  forthcoming,  and  the  levies  thus 
raised  were  pushed  down  to  the  seat  of  war  as  fast 
as  they  could  be  equipped  and  drilled.  And  on  the 
reorganisation  of  the  Bengal  army  these  Punjab  levies 
have  formed  a  large  component  part  of  it." 


270  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

You  see,  the  mutiny  was  in  a  great  measure  put 
down  by  turning  the  races  of  India  against  each 
other.  So  long  as  this  can  be  done,  and  so  long  as 
the  population  have  not  formed  the  habit  of  criti- 
cising their  Government,  whatever  it  be,  and  of 
rebelling  against  it,  the  government  of  India  from 
England  is  possible,  and  there  is  nothing  miraculous 
about  it.  But,  as  I  said,  if  this  state  of  things  should 
alter,  if  by  any  process  the  population  should  be 
welded  into  a  single  nationality,  if  our  relation  to  it 
should  come  to  resemble  even  distantly  the  relation 
of  Austria  to  Italy,  then  I  do  not  say  we  ought  to 
begin  to  fear  for  our  dominion ;  I  say  we  ought  to 
cease  at  once  to  hope  for  it.  I  do  not  imagine 
that  the  danger  we  have  to  apprehend  is  that  of  a 
popular  insurrection.  In  some  of  the  alarmist  litera- 
ture, for  instance,  in  Mr.  Elliot's  book  entitled, 
Concerning  John's  Indian  Affairs,  I  find  harrowing 
pictures  of  the  misery  of  the  poor  ryot,  and  then  the 
conclusion  drawn  as  a  matter  of  course  that  this 
misery  must  lead  to  an  explosion  of  despair,  by 
which  we  shall  be  expelled.  Whether  the  descrip- 
tions are  true  this  is  not  the  place  to  inquire ;  but 
granting  the  truth  of  them  for  argument's  sake,  I  do 
not  find  in  history  that  revolutions  are  caused  in  this 
way.  I  find  great  populations  cowering  in  abject 
misery  for  centuries  together,  but  they  do  not  rise  in 
rebellion;  no,  if  they  cannot  live  they  die,  and  if 
they  can  only  just  live,  then  they  just  live,  their 
sensibilities  dulled  and  their  very  wishes  crushed  out 
by  want.     A  population  that  rebels  is  a  population 


IV  HOW  WE  GOVEKN  INDIA  271 

that  is  looking  up,  that  has  begun  to  hope  and  to 
feel  its  strength.  But  if  such  a  rising  took  place,  it 
would  be  put  down  by  the  native  soldiery  so  long  as 
they  have  not  learned  to  feel  themselves  brothers  to 
the  Hindu  and  foreigners  to  the  Englishman  that 
commands  them.  But  on  the  other  hand  if  this 
feeling  ever  does  spring  up,  if  India  does  begin  to 
breathe  as  a  single  national  whole — and  our  own  rule 
is  perhaps  doing  more  than  ever  was  done  by  former 
Governments  to  make  this  possible — then  no  such 
explosion  of  despair,  even  if  there  were  cause  for  it, 
would  be  needed.  For  in  that  case  the  feeling  would 
soon  gain  the  native  army,  and  on  the  native  anny 
ultimately  we  depend.  We  could  subdue  the  mutiny 
of  1857,  formidable  as  it  was,  because  it  spread 
through  only  a  part  of  the  army,  because  the  people 
did  not  actively  sympathise  with  it,  and  because  it 
was  possible  to  find  native  Indian  races  who  would 
fight  on  our  side.  But  the  moment  a  mutiny  is  but 
threatened  which  shall  be  no  mere  mutiny,  but  the 
expression  of  a  universal  feeling  of  nationality,  at 
that  moment  all  hope  is  at  an  end,  as  all  desire  ought 
to  be  at  an  end,  of  preserving  our  Empire.  For  we 
are  not  really  conquerors  of  India,  and  we  cannot 
rule  her  as  conquerors ;  if  we  undertook  to  do  so,  it 
is  not  necessary  to  inquire  whether  we  could  succeed, 
for  we  should  assuredly  be  ruined  financially  by  the 
mere  attempt. 


LECTURE  V 

MUTUAL   INFLUENCE  OF  ENGLAND  AND   INDIA 

In  the  last  two  lectures  I  was  engaged  in  showing 
that  the  conquest  of  India  and  the  government  of  it 
by  the  English  have  in  a  certain  sense  nothing 
wonderful  about  them.  We  may  fairly  be  proud  of 
many  particular  deeds  done  by  our  countrymen  in 
India,  and  of  many  men  who  in  India  have  shown  a 
rare  energy  and  talent  for  government,  but  it  is  a 
mistake  to  suppose  that  the  Empire  itself  is  a  stand- 
ing proof  of  some  vast  superiority  in  the  English 
race  over  the  races  of  India.  Without  assuming  any 
such  vast  superiority  we  are  able  to  assign  causes, 
which  are  sufficient  to  account  alike  for  the  growth 
and  for  the  continuance  of  that  Empire.  It  is  not 
then  wonderful,  if  by  wonderful  be  meant  simply 
miraculous,  or  difficult  to  account  for  by  ordinary 
causation. 

Nevertheless  there  is  a  sense  in  which  it  is  not 
only  wonderful,  but  far  more  wonderful  than  is 
commonly  understood.     It  is  wonderful  rather  in  its 


V    MUTUAL  INFLUENCE  OF  ENGLAND  AND  INDIA    273 

consequences  than  in  its  causes.  In  other  words,  it 
is  great  in  the  peculiarly  historical  sense,  for  the 
pregnancy  of  events,  as  we  remarked,  is  what  gives 
them  historical  rank.  By  applying  this  test  we 
raised  the  rank  of  several  events  in  English  history, 
especially  the  American  Eevolution,  which  for  want 
of  dramatic  or  romantic  interest  are  too  little  studied. 
Let  us  now  remark  that  the  Indian  Empire,  however 
it  may  seem  less  marvellous  on  close  examination 
than  at  jfirst  sight,  will  be  found  to  gain  in  historic 
interest,  as  much  as  it  loses  in  romantic. 

A  vast  Oriental  Empire  is  not  necessarily  at  all  an 
interesting  or  a  particularly  important  thing.  There 
have  been  many  such  Empires  in  Asia,  which  historic- 
ally are  less  important  than  a  single  Greek  or  Tuscan 
city-republic.  That  they  have  been  of  wide  extent, 
or  even  of  long  duration,  does  not  make  them  inter- 
esting. Generally  when  we  examine  them  we  find 
that  they  are  of  a  low  organisation,  and  that  under 
their  weight  the  individual  is  crushed,  so  that  he 
enjoys  no  happiness,  makes  no  progress,  and  pro- 
duces nothing  memorable.  And  perhaps  when  first 
we  turn  our  thoughts  towards  our  Indian  Empire, 
we  may  receive  the  impression  that  it  is  not  intrins- 
ically more  interesting  than  the  average  of  such 
overgrown  Asiatic  despotisms.  We  trust  indeed 
that,  thanks  to  the  control  of  English  public  opinion, 
it  may  stand  at  a  higher  level  of  intelligence, 
morality,  and  philanthropy  than  the  Mogul  Empire 
which  it  has  succeeded.  But  at  best  we  think  of  it 
as  a  good  specimen  of  a  bad  political  system.     We 

T 


274  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

are  not  disposed  to  be  proud  of  the  succession  of  the 
Great  Mogul.  We  doubt  whether  with  all  the  merits 
of  our  administration  the  subjects  of  it  are  happy. 
We  may  even  doubt  whether  our  rule  is  preparing 
them  for  a  happier  condition,  whether  it  may  not  be 
sinking  them  lower  in  misery,  and  we  have  our 
misgivings  that  perhaps  a  genuine  Asiatic  Govern- 
ment, and  still  more  a  national  Government  springing 
up  out  of  the  Hindu  population  itself,  might  in  the 
long  run  be  more  beneficial  because  more  congenial, 
though  perhaps  less  civilised,  than  such  a  foreign 
unsympathetic  government  as  our  own. 

But  let  us  consider  that  it  is  not  quite  every 
Empire  which  is  thus  uninteresting.  The  Roman 
Empire  for  example  is  not  so.  I  may  say  this  now 
without  fear,  because  our  views  of  history  have 
grown  considerably  less  exclusive  of  late  years. 
There  was  a  time  no  doubt  when  even  the  Roman 
Empire,  because  it  was  despotic  and  in  some  periods 
unhappy  and  half-barbarous,  was  thought  uninterest- 
ing. A  generation  ago  it  was  the  reigning  opinion 
that  there  is  nothing  good  in  politics  but  liberty,  and 
that  accordingly  in  history  all  those  periods  are  to  be 
passed  over  and,  as  it  were,  cancelled,  in  which 
liberty  is  not  to  be  found.  Along  with  this  opinion 
there  prevailed  a  habit  of  reading  history,  as  we  read 
poetry,  only  for  an  exalted  kind  of  pleasure,  and  this 
habit  led  us,  whenever  we  came  to  a  period  in  which 
there  was  nothing  glorious  or  admirable,  to  shut  the 
book.  In  those  days  no  doubt  the  Roman  Empire 
too  was  condemned.     The  Roman  Republic  was  held 


V    MUTUAL  INFLUENCE  OF  ENGLAND  AND  INDIA    275 

in  honour  for  its  freedom ;  the  earlier  Eoman  Empire 
was  studied  for  the  traces  of  freedom  still  discernible 
in  it.  But  we  used  to  shut  the  book  at  the  end  of 
the  second  century,  as  if  all  that  followed  for  some 
ten  centuries  were  decay  and  ruin ;  and  we  did  not 
take  up  the  story  again  with  any  satisfaction  until 
the  traces  of  liberty  began  to  reappear  in  England 
and  in  the  Italian  republics.  I  suppose  I  may  say 
that  this  way  of  regarding  history  is  now  obsolete. 
We  do  not  now  read  it  simply  for  pleasure,  but  in 
order  that  we  may  discover  the  laws  of  political 
growth  and  change,  and  therefore  we  hardly  stop  to 
inquire  whether  the  period  before  us  is  glorious  or 
dismal  It  is  enough  if  it  is  instructive  and  teaches 
lessons  not  to  be  learned  from  other  periods.  We 
have  also  learnt  that  there  are  many  other  good 
things  in  politics  besides  liberty ;  for  instance  there 
is  nationality,  there  is  civilisation.  Now  it  often 
happens  that  a  Government  which  allows  no  liberty 
is  nevertheless  most  valuable  and  most  favourable  to 
progress  towards  these  other  goals.  Hence  the 
Eoman  Empire — not  only  in  its  beginnings  but  in  its 
later  developments  up  to  the  thirteenth  century — is 
now  regarded,  in  spite  of  all  the  barbarism,  all  the 
superstition,  and  all  the  misery,  as  one  of  the  most 
interesting  of  all  historical  phenomena.  For  it  is 
perceived  that  this  Empire  is  by  no  means  without 
internal  progress,  without  creative  ideas,  or  without 
memorable  results.  We  discern  in  it  the  embryo  of 
that  which  is  greatest  and  most  wonderful,  namely, 
the    modern    brotherhood    or    loose    federation    of 


276  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

civilised  nations.  And  therefore,  though  it  was  a 
great  Empire,  and  though  it  was  despotically  governed, 
it  is  studied  with  infinite  curiosity  and  attention. 

This   difference  between  the  Roman  Empire  and 
other  Empires  founded  on  conquest,  arises  from  the 
superiority   in  civilisation  of  the  conquerors  to   the 
conquered.     A  great  conquering  race  is' not  usually 
advanced  in  civilisation.     The  typical  conqueror  is 
some  Cyrus  or  Zinghis  Khan— that  is,  the  chieftain  of 
a  hardy  tribe,  which  has  been  steeled  by  poverty  and 
is  tempted  by  plunder.      Before  such  an  assailant  the 
advanced  civilisation  is  apt  to  go  down,  so  that  in 
history  we  see  civilisation  often  conquered,  sometimes 
holding  its  ground,  but  not  very  often  making  great 
conquests,  until  in  recent  times  the  progress  of  inven- 
tion strengthened  it  by  giving  it  new  weapons.     The 
great  conquering  race  of  history  has  been  one  of  the 
least  progressive,  the  Turcomans.     It  was  from  this 
race  mainly,  from   the   hive  of  tribesmen,   who   in 
Central  Asia  furnished  mercenary  armies  to  all  the 
ambitious  kings  of  Asia,  that  Baber  and  Akber  drew 
the  force  with  which  they  conquered  India.     Such  is 
the  ordinary  rule,  but  when  an  exceptional  case  does 
occur,  when  high  civilisation  is  spread  by  conquest 
over   populations  less  advanced,    the    Empire   thus 
formed  has   a   very   peculiar  interest.      Of   such   a 
nature  for  instance   was  the   conquest  of   the   East 
by  Alexander  the  Great,  because   the  Macedonians 
through   their   close   relationship   with   the    Greeks 
brought  all  Hellenism  in  their  train.     Accordingly, 
though  the  kingdoms  of  the  Diadochi  were  in  them- 


V    MUTUAL  INFLUENCE  OF  ENGLAND  AND  INDIA    277 

selves  but  military  despotisms  of  a  low  type,  yet  the 
strangest  and  most  memorable  effects  were  produced 
by  the  fusion  of  Greek  with  Oriental  thought.  Still 
more  remarkable,  because  it  lasted  much  longer  and 
because  it  is  much  better  known,  was  the  effect  pro- 
duced upon  the  nations  of  Europe  by  the  Eoman 
Empire.  In  fact  this  great  phenomenon  stands  out 
in  the  very  centre  of  human  history,  and  may  be 
called  the  foundation  of  the  present  civilisation  of 
mankind. 

Now  it  will  make  all  the  difference  if  the  English 
conquest  of  India  is  to  be  classed  along  with  the 
Greek  conquest  of  the  East  and  the  Roman  conquest 
of  Gaul  and  Spain,  and  not  along  with  those  of  the 
Great  Turk  and  the  Great  Mogul.  If  it  belongs  to 
the  latter  class,  we  shall  not  be  misled  by  any  mere 
splendour  or  magnitude,  but  shall  pronounce  it  to  be 
a  phenomenon  of  secondary  interest,  belonging  to  the 
history  of  barbarism  rather  than  to  that  of  civilisa- 
tion. But  if  it  belongs  to  the  former,  we  shall  be 
prepared  to  place  it  among  the  transcendent  events 
of  the  world,  those  events  which  rise  as  high  above 
the  average  of  civilised  history  as  an  ordinary 
Oriental  conquest  falls  below  it. 

There  need  be  no  question  about  the  general  fact 
that  the  ruling  race  in  British  India  has  a  higher  and 
more  vigorous  civilisation  than  the  native  races.  We 
may  say  this  without  taking  too  much  to  ourselves. 
The  English,  as  such,  are  perhaps  not  a  race  of 
Hellenic  intelligence  or  genius,  but  the  civilisation 
they  iahciit  is  not  simply  their  own.     It  is  European 


278  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

civilisation,  the  product  of  the  united  labour  of  the 
European  races  held  together  and  animated  by  the 
spirit  of  the  ancient  world.  What  do  we  see  on  the 
other  side?  What  estimate  shall  we  form  of  the 
native  civilisation  of  India  ? 

As  I  have  said  so  often,  India  is  not  one  country, 
and  therefore  it  has  not  one  civilisation.     It  has  not 
even  so  much  unity  as  it  seems  to  have,  for  Brahmin- 
ism  by  its  peculiar  trick  of  absorption  and  assimila- 
tion has  brought  together  under  one  name  forms  of 
civilisation  which  are  really   diverse.     If   we   look 
below  the   surface,  we   find  two   distinct  layers   of 
population,  a  fair-skinned  and  a  dark-skinned  race. 
The  two  layers  are  visible  almost  everywhere ;  the 
dark  layer   preponderates  in  the  South;  it  is  out- 
numbered but  clearly  visible  in  Bengal  ;  it  is  evanes- 
cent perhaps  higher  up  the  Ganges  ;  but  that  the  two 
races  did  really  blend  almost  all  over  India  appears 
from  the  fact  that  no  language  is  now  spoken  which  is 
a  mere  corruption  or  dialect  of  Sanscrit,  as  French 
and   Italian   are   dialects   of    Latin.      Every   Hindi 
language,    even   when  its    vocabulary   is    most   ex- 
clusively Sanscrit,  has  inflections  and  forms  which  are 
non-Aryan.^     Now  in   estimating  the  civilisation  of 
India  we  must  begin  by  taking  account  of  this  funda- 
mental distinction  of  race.     The  dark-skinned  race  is 
in  many  parts  not  civilised,  and  ought  to  be  classed  as 
barbarous.     Mr.   B.    H.    Hodgson   says,    "In   every 
extensive  jungly  or  hilly  tract  throughout  the  vast 
continent  of  India  there  exist  hundreds  of  thousands 
*  Stated  on  the  authority  of  Professor  Cowell. 


,v    MUTUAL  INFLUENCE  OF  ENGLAND  AND  INDIA    279 

of  human  beings  in  a  state  not  materially  different 
from  that  of  the  Germans  as  described  by  Tacitus." 

We  are  to  distinguish  again  between  the  Hindu 
races  proper  and  the  great  Mussulman  immigration. 
There  are  not  less  than  fifty  millions  of  Mussulmans 
in  India,  and  of  these  a  large  proportion  consists  of 
Afghans  or  Pathans,  Arabs,  Persians,  and  Turco- 
mans or  Tartars  who  have  at  difTerent  times  entered 
India  either  with,  or  in  order  to  join,  the  armies  of 
the  Mussulman  conquerors.  Here  we  may  expect  to 
find,  as  everywhere  in  the  Mussulman  world,  a  sort 
of  semi-civilisation,  certain  strong  virtues  but  of  a 
primitive  kind ;  in  short  an  equipment  of  ideas 
and  views  not  sufficient  for  the  modern  forms  of 
society. 

Then  finally  we  come  to  the  characteristically 
Indian  population,  the  Aryan  race  which  descended 
from  the  Punjab  with  the  Sanscrit  language  on  its 
lips,  which  spread  itself  mainly  along  the  valley  of 
the  Ganges,  but  succeeded  in  spreading  its  peculiar 
theocratic  system  over  the  whole  of  India.  Perhaps 
no  race  has  shown  a  greater  aptitude  for  civilisation. 
Even  its  barbarism,  as  reflected  in  the  Vedic  liter- 
ature, is  humane  and  intelligent.  And  after  its 
settlement  in  India  it  advanced  normally  along  the 
path  of  civilisation.  Its  customs  grew  into  laws,  and 
■were  consolidated  in  codes.  It  imagined  the  division 
of  labour.  It  created  poetry  and  philosophy  and  the 
beginnings  of  science.  Out  of  its  bosom  sprang  a 
mighty  religious  reform  called  Buddhism,  which 
remains  to   this   day   one   of   the   leading   religious 


280  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

systems  of  the  world.  So  far  then  it  resembled  those 
gifted  races  which  created  our  own  civilisation. 

But  the  Aryan  race  did  not  make  so  much  pro- 
gress in  India  as  in  Europe.  As  it  showed  in  India 
an  extreme  incapacity  for  writing  history,  so  that  no 
record  of  it  remains  except  where  it  came  in  contact 
with  Greek  or  Mussulman  invaders,  we  can  only  con- 
jecture the  causes  that  may  have  retarded  its  pro- 
gress. But  the  great  religious  reform  after  some 
centuries  of  success  for  some  reason  or  other  failed ; 
Buddhism  was  expelled.  The  tyranny  of  the  priestly 
caste  was  firmly  established.  No  great  and  solid 
political  system  grew  up  ;  there  was  little  city-civil- 
isation. And  then  came  the  scourge  of  foreign 
conquest. 

Subjection  for  a  long  time  to  a  foreign  yoke  is  one 
of  the  most  potent  causes  of  national  deterioration. 
And  the  few  facts  we  know  about  the  ancient  Hindus 
confirm  what  we  should  conjecture  about  the  moral 
effects  produced  upon  them  by  their  misfortunes.-' 
We  have  in  the  Greek  writer  Arrian  a  description  of 
the  Indian  character,  which  we  read  with  surprise. 
He  says,  "They  are  remarkably  brave,  superior  in 
war  to  all  Asiatics ;  they  are  remarkable  for  simplicity 
and  integrity  ;  so  reasonable  as  never  to  have  recourse 
to  a  lawsuit  and  so  honest  as  neither  to  require  locks 
to  their  doors  nor  writings  to  bind  their  agreements. 
No  Indian   was   ever   known   to   tell   an   untruth." 


^  See  this  subject  treated  at  much  greater  length  by  Professor 
Max-Miillcr  in  his  recently  published  volume,  U7m<  can  India 
teach  icst 


V    MUTUAL  INFLUENCE  OF  ENGLAND  AND  INDIA    281 

This  description  has  no  doubt  an  air  of  exaggeration 
about  it,  but,  as  Elphinstone  remarks,  it  shows  that 
an  extraordinary  change  has  passed  over  the  Hindu 
character  since  it  was  written.  Exaggeration  consists 
in  exhibiting  the  real  features  larger  than  they  ought 
to  be.  But  this  description  exhibits  on  an  unnatural 
scale  precisely  the  features  that  are  wanting  in  the 
modern  Hindu  character.  Modern  travellers  there- 
fore are  found  to  exaggerate  the  very  opposite 
features.  They  accuse  the  Hindu  of  want  of  veracity, 
want  of  valour,  and  extreme  litigiousness.  But  the 
change  is  precisely  such  as  might  naturally  be  pro- 
duced by  a  long  period  of  submission  to  the  foreigner. 
On  the  whole  then  we  find  in  India  three  stages 
of  civilisation — first,  that  of  the  hill-tribes,  which  is 
barbarism,  then  that  which  is  perhaps  sufficiently 
described  as  the  Mussulman  stage,  and  thirdly,  the 
arrested  and  half-crushed  civilisation  of  a  gifted  race, 
but  a  race  which  has  from  the  beginning  been  in  a 
remarkable  manner  isolated  from  the  ruling  and 
progressive  civilisation  of  the  world.  Whatever  this 
race  achieved  it  achieved  a  long  time  ago.  Its  great 
epic  poems,  which  some  would  compare  to  the  greatest 
poems  of  the  West,  are  ancient,  though  perhaps  much 
less  ancient  than  has  been  thought,  so  too  its  systems 
of  philosophy,  its  scientific  grammar.  The  country 
has  achieved  nothing  in  modern  times.  It  may  be 
compared  to  Europe,  as  Europe  would  have  been  if 
after  the  irruption  of  barbarians  and  the  f.ill  of  ancient 
civilisation  it  had  witnessed  no  revival,  and  had  not 
been  able  to  protect  itself  against  the  Tait;ir  invasions 


282  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

of  the  tenth  and  thirteenth  centuries.  Let  us  suppose 
Europe  to  have  vegetated  up  to  the  present  time  in 
the  condition  in  which  the  tenth  century  saw  it, 
exposed  to  periodical  invasions  from  Asia,  wanting  in 
strongly  marked  nations  and  vigorous  states,  its 
languages  mere  vernaculars  not  used  for  the  purposes 
of  literature,  all  its  wisdom  enshrined  in  a  dead 
language  and  doled  out  to  the  people  by  an  imperious 
priesthood,  all  its  wisdom  too  many  centuries  old, 
sacred  texts  of  Aristotle,  the  Vulgate,  and  the  Fathers, 
to  which  nothing  could  be  added  but  in  the  way  of 
commentary.  Such  seems  to  be  the  condition  of  the 
Aryans  of  India,  a  condition  which  has  no  resemblance 
whatever  to  barbarism,  but  resembles  strikingly  the 
medieval  phase  of  the  civilisation  of  the  West. 

The  dominion  of  Eome  over  the  western  races  was 
the  empire  of  civilisation  over  barbarism.  Among 
Gauls  and  Iberians  Rome  stood  as  a  beacon-light ; 
they  acknowledged  its  brightness,  and  felt  grateful 
for  the  illumination  they  received  from  it.  The 
dominion  of  England  in  India  is  rather  the  empire  of 
the  modern  world  over  the  medieval.  The  light  we 
bring  is  not  less  real,  but  it  is  probably  less  attractive 
and  received  with  less  gratitude.  It  is  not  a  glorious 
light  shining  in  darkness,  but  a  somewhat  cold  day- 
light introduced  into  the  midst  of  a  warm  gorgeous 
twilight. 

Many  travellers  have  said  that  the  learned  Hindu, 
even  when  he  acknowledges  our  power  and  makes 
use  of  our  railways,  is  so  far  from  regarding  us  with 
reverence  that  he  very  sincerely  despises  us.     This 


V    MUTUAL  INFLUENCE  OF  ENGLAND  AND  INDIA    283 

is  only  natural  We  are  not  cleverer  than  the  Hindu ; 
our  minds  are  not  richer  or  larger  than  his.  We 
cannot  astonish  him,  as  we  astonish  the  barbarian, 
by  putting  before  him  ideas  that  he  never  dreamed 
of.  He  can  match  from  his  poetry  our  sublimest 
thoughts ;  even  our  science  perhaps  has  few  concep- 
tions that  are  altogether  novel  to  him.  Our  boast  is 
not  that  we  have  more  ideas  or  more  brilliant  ideas, 
but  that  our  ideas  are  better  tested  and  sounder.  The 
greatness  of  modern,  as  compared  with  medieval  or 
ancient,  civilisation  is  that  it  possesses  a  larger  stock 
of  demonstrated  truth,  and  therefore  infinitely  more  of 
practical  power.  But  the  poetical  or  mystic  philoso- 
pher is  by  no  means  disposed  to  regard  demonstrated 
truth  with  reverence ;  he  is  rather  apt  to  call  it 
shallow,  and  to  sneer  at  its  practical  triumphs,  while 
he  revels  for  his  part  in  reverie  and  the  luxury  of 
unbounded  speculation. 

We  in  Europe  however  are  pretty  well  agreed  that 
the  treasure  of  truth  which  forms  the  nucleus  of  the 
civilisation  of  the  West  is  incomparably  more  sterling 
not  only  than  the  Brahminic  mysticism  with  which  it 
has  to  contend,  but  even  than  that  Roman  enlighten- 
ment which  the  old  Empire  transmitted  to  the  nations 
of  Europe.  And  therefore  we  shall  hold  that  the 
spectacle  now  presented  by  India  of  a  superior 
civilisation  introduced  by  a  conquering  race  is  equal 
in  interest  and  importance  to  that  which  the  Koman 
Empire  presented.  Moreover  the  experiment  is  tried 
on  a  scale  equally  large.  This  Empire  is  usually 
judged  by  its  immediate  effect  on  the  welfare  of  the 


284  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot, 

inhabitants.  It  has  removed  evils  of  long  standing, 
says  one ;  it  has  introduced  new  evils,  says  another. 
This  whole  controversy  puts  on  one  side  the  most 
characteristic  work  of  our  Empire,  which  is  the 
introduction  in  the  midst  of  Brahminism  of  European 
views  of  the  Universe.  No  experiment  equally 
interesting  is  now  being  tried  on  the  surface  of  the 
globe.  And  when  we  consider  how  seldom  it  is  put 
in  the  power  of  a  nation  to  accomplish  a  task  so 
memorable,  we  shall  learn  to  take  an  eager  interest  in 
the  progress  of  the  experiment,  and  to  check  the 
despondency  which  might  lead  us  to  ask  what  profit 
accrues  to  ourselves  from  all  this  labour  that  we  have 
undertaken  under  the  sun. 

And  now  let  us  take  note  of  a  great  advantage 
which  we  enjoy  in  working  at  this  task.  It  comes  to 
light  when  we  compare  our  Empire  v/ith  the  Roman. 
Rome  was  placed  in  the  midst  of  its  Empire,  was 
subject  to  an  overwhelming  reaction  from  it,  and 
was  exposed  to  all  the  dangers  which  threatened  it. 
England  on  the  other  hand  is  singularly  disengaged 
from  this  enormous  Empire  which  it  governs,  and 
feels  but  a  slight  reaction  from  it. 

Every  historical  student  knows  that  it  was  the 
incubus  of  the  Empire  which  destroyed  liberty  at 
Rome.  Those  old  civic  institutions,  which  had  nursed 
Roman  greatness  and  to  which  Rome  owed  all  the 
civilisation  which  she  was  to  transmit  to  the  countries 
of  the  West,  had  to  be  given  up  as  a  condition  of 
transmitting  it.  She  had  to  adopt  an  organisation 
of,    coujiJiiratively,   a   low    type.      Her    civilisation, 


V    MUTUAL  INFLUENCE  OF  ENGLAND  AND  INDIA    285 

when  she  transmitted  it,  was  already  in  decay.  In  a 
great  part  of  the  Empire  her  very  language  was 
worsted  in  the  competition  by  the  Greek,  so  that  the 
Emperor  M.  Aurelius  himself  writes  his  Meditations 
in  Greek.  The  Eoman  religion  instead  of  making 
converts  fell  into  neglect,  and  in  the  end  gave  way  to 
a  religion  which  had  sprung  up  in  a  distant  province 
of  the  Empire.  There  came  a  time  when  almost  all 
that  was  Roman  in  thought  and  feeling  seemed  to  be 
dead  in  the  Empire  of  Rome,  when  its  Emperors  were 
like  Oriental  kings  and  wore  the  diadem.  We  know 
now  that  this  was  not  so,  and  that  Roman  influence, 
the  Roman  tradition,  continued  to  sway  the  European 
mind  for  many  centuries.  But  this  sway  was  exerted 
secretly,  through  law  and  through  Catholicism,  at  a 
later  time  through  the  Renaissance  in  literature  and 
art.  Think  how  different  would  have  been  the  course 
of  modern  European  history  if  tlio  mother-city  of  its 
civilisation,  instead  of  being  in  the  midst  of  the 
nations  it  educated,  instead  of  suffering  in  their 
discords  and  convulsions,  instead  of  receiving  as 
much  barbarism  from  them  as  it  gave  civilisation  to 
them,  had  stood  outside,  enjoying  an  independent 
prosperity,  developing  its  own  civilisation  further 
with  an  unabated  vigour  of  youth  all  the  while  that 
it  guided  the  subject  nations. 

The  Roman  Empire  is  in  this  respect  a  somewhat 
extreme  case,  because  the  conquering  Power  was  so 
remarkably  small  compared  to  the  empire  it  attached 
to  itself.  The  light  radiated  not  from  a  country  but 
from  a  city,  which  was  not  so  much  a  shining  disk  as 


286  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

a  point  of  intense  light.  The  Roman  Republic  had 
institutions  which  were  essentially  civic,  and  which 
began  to  break  down  as  soon  as  they  were  extended 
even  to  the  whole  of  Italy.  But  even  where  the 
conquering  Power  has  a  much  broader  basis,  it  is 
commonly  altogether  transformed  by  the  effort  of 
conquest.  The  wars  by  which  the  conquest  is  made, 
and  then  the  establishments  necessary  to  maintain 
the  conquest,  call  for  a  new  system  of  government 
and  finance.  Of  all  the  unparalleled  features  which 
the  English  Empire  in  India  presents,  not  one  is  so 
unique  as  the  slightness  of  the  machinery  by  which 
it  is  united  to  England  and  the  slightness  of  its 
reaction  upon  England.  How  this  peculiarity  has 
been  caused  I  have  already  explained.  I  have  shown 
that  our  acquisition  of  India  was  made  by  a  process 
so  peculiar  that  it  cost  us  nothing.  Had  England  as 
a  state  undertaken  to  subvert  the  Empire  of  the 
Great  Mogul,  she  would  have  destroyed  her  own 
constitution  in  the  process,  no  less  than  Rome  did 
by  the  conquest  of  Europe.  For  she  would  evidently 
have  been  compelled  to  convert  herself  into  a  military 
state  of  the  most  absolute  type.  But  as  England  has 
merely  inherited  the  throne  which  was  founded  in 
India  by  certain  Englishmen  who  rose  to  the  head  of 
affairs  in  time  of  anarchy,  she  has  been  but  very 
slightly  disturbed  in  her  domestic  affairs  by  this 
acquisition.  It  has  modified  no  doubt,  as  I  have  said, 
her  foreign  policy  in  a  great  degree,  but  it  has 
produced  no  change  in  the  internal  character  of  the 
English  state.     In  this  respect  India  has  produced  a.s 


V    MUTUAL  INFLUENCE  OF  ENGLAND  AND  INDIA    287 

little  effect  upon  England  as  those  Continental  States 
which  have  been  in  modern  times  connected  with 
England  in  what  is  called  a  personal  union,  Hannover 
under  the  Georges,  or  Holland  under  William  HI. 
The  consequence  is  that  in  this  instance  the  operation 
of  the  higher  civilisation  on  the  lower  is  likely  to  be 
far  more  energetic  and  continuous  than  in  those 
ancient  examples  of  the  Roman  Empire  or  the  Greek- 
Empire  in  the  East.  In  those  cases  the  lower  civilisa- 
tion killed  the  higher  in  the  same  moment  that 
the  higher  raised  the  lower  towards  its  own  level. 
Hellenism  covered  the  East,  but  the  greatness  of 
Greece  came  to  an  end.  All  nations  crowded  into 
the  Roman  citizenship ;  but  what  became  of  the 
original  Romans  themselves  1  England  on  the  other 
hand  is  not  weakened  at  all  by  the  virtue  that  goes 
out  from  her.  She  tries  to  raise  India  out  of  the 
medieval  into  the  modern  phase,  and  in  the  task  she 
meets  with  difficulties  and  even  incurs  dangers,  but 
she  incurs  no  risk  whatever  of  being  drawn  down  by 
India  towards  the  lower  level,  or  even  of  being 
checked  for  a  moment  in  her  natural  development. 

This  has  been  the  result ;  but  for  a  long  time  it 
was  uncertain  that  the  result  would  be  such.  In  the 
history  of  British  India  there  are  two  most  interest- 
ing chapters — I  should  say  that  in  the  whole  history 
of  the  world  there  are  no  chapters  more  instructive — 
in  which  we  learn,  first,  how  a  mischievous  reaction 
from  India  upon  England  was  prevented ;  secondly, 
how  European  civilisation  was,  after  much  delay  and 
hesitation,  resolutely  brought   to   bear   upon  India 


288  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

The  first  chapter  embraces  chronologically  the  first 
half  of  George  IIL's  reign,  that  stormy  period  of 
transition  in  English  history  when  at  the  same  time 
America  was  lost  and  India  won.  It  covers  the  two 
great  careers  of  Olive  and  Hastings,  and  the  end  of 
the  struggle  is  marked  by  the  reign  of  Lord  Corn- 
wallis,  which  began  in  1785.  The  second  chapter 
•embraces  about  the  first  forty  years  of  the  present 
century,  and  the  crowning  point  of  this  development  is 
the  Governor-Generalship  of  Lord  William  Bentinck. 
For  in  the  Indian  Empire  Lord  Cornwallis  and  Lord 
W.  Bentinck  have  been  the  two  great  legislators  after 
Hastings,  as  Lord  "Wellesley,  Lord  Hastings  and 
Lord  Dalhousie  have  been,  after  Clive,  the  great 
conquerors,  and  when  we  consider,  as  we  are  doing 
now,  the  progress  of  civilisation  in  the  Empire,  the 
great  legislators  naturally  demand  our  attention 
most. 

First  then  let  us  consider  the  reaction  which  at 
the  beginning  India  threatened  to  have  upon  England, 
and  how  this  danger  was  averted.  The  literature  of 
the  seventies  and  the  eighties  of  the  eighteenth 
century  is  full  of  that  alarm  which  found  its  strongest 
expression  in  the  speeches  of  Burke  against  Warren 
Hastings.  England  had  taken  a  sudden  plunge  into 
the  unknown  abyss  of  Hindu  politics.  Englishmen 
were  becoming  finance  ministers  or  commanders  of 
mercenary  troops  to  Mussulman  Nawabs,  and  were 
bringing  back  to  England  the  plunder  of  the  Mogul 
Empire,  acquired  no  one  knew  how.  There  were  two 
dangers  here — first,  lest  the  English  character  should 


V    MUTUAL  INFLUENCE  OF  ENGLAND  AND  INDIA    289 

be  corrupted,  for  those  who  take  the  most  favourable 
view  of  the  Hindu  character  would  admit  that  Hindu 
politics  in  the  last  century  were  unspeakably  corrupt ; 
secondly,  lest  the  wealthy  adventurers,  returning  to 
England  and  entering  into  English  political  life  with 
ideas  formed  in  Asia,  should  upset  the  balance  of 
the  constitution.  This  was  particularly  to  be  feared 
under  the  old  electoral  system,  which  allowed  so 
many  seats  in  Parliament  to  be  put  up  to  sale. 
Moreover  in  an  age  when  Government  derived  its 
chief  power  from  patronage,  there  was  a  danger  lest 
one  of  the  contending  parties  should  make  a  snatch 
at  the  vast  patronage  of  India,  a  prize  which,  whether 
it  fell  to  the  King  or  to  the  Whig  party,  would 
probably  make  its  possessor  supreme  in  the  State. 

To  give  you  a  specimen  of  the  fears  which  were 
entertained  by  leading  men,  I  will  read  a  passage 
from  William  Pitt's  motion  for  parliamentary  reform 
made  in  1782.  He  said,  "Our  laws  have  with  a 
jealous  care  provided  that  no  foreigner  shall  give  a 
single  vote  for  a  representative  in  Parliament ;  and 
yet  we  now  see  foreign  princes  not  giving  votes  but 
purchasing  seats  in  this  House,  and  sending  their 
agents  to  sit  with  us  as  representatives  of  the  nation. 
No  man  can  doubt  what  I  allude  to.  We  have 
sitting  among  us  the  members  of  the  Rajah  of  Tan- 
jore  and  the  Nawab  of  Arcot,  the  representatives  of 
petty  Eastern  despots  ;  and  this  is  notorious,  publicly 
talked  of  and  heard  with  indifference;  our  shame 
stalks  abroad  in  the  open  face  of  day,  it  is  become 
too  common  even  to  excite  surprise.  We  treat  it  as 
U 


290  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

a  matter  of  small  importance  that  some  of  the  electors 
of  Great  Britain  have  added  treason  to  their  corrup- 
tion and  have  traitorously  sold  their  votes  to  foreign 
Powers;  that  some  of  the  members  of  our  Senate 
are  at  the  command  of  a  distant  tyrant ;  that  our 
Senators  are  no  longer  the  representatives  of  British 
virtue  but  of  the  vices  and  pollutions  of  the  East." 

The  great  incidents  of  this  struggle  are,  the  fall 
of  the  Coalition  Ministry  on  the  India  Bill  of  Fox 
and  the  passing  of  the  India  Bill  of  Pitt,  the  trial  of 
Warren  Hastings,  the  succession  of  Lord  Cornwallis 
to  the  Governor-Generalship,  and  the  administrative 
reform  carried  out  by  him  in  India.  I  merely  touch 
these  great  occurrences  to  mark  their  significance 
and  to  show  what  results  flowed  from  them.  If  I 
went  into  detail,  I  might  show  that  much  was  un- 
reasonable in  the  clamour  raised  against  the  India 
Bill  of  Fox,  and  that  there  was  much  unreasonable 
violence  in  the  attacks  made  upon  Hastings.  I  might 
also  criticise  the  double  system  introduced  by  the 
India  Bill  of  Pitt.  But,  taking  a  broad  view,  it  must 
be  said  that  the  particular  dangers  feared  were  very 
successfully  averted,  that  Lord  Cornwallis  established 
a  title  to  gratitude  and  Edmund  Burke  to  immortal 
glory.  For  the  stain  of  immorality  did  pass  away 
as  by  magic  from  the  administration  of  the  Company 
under  the  rule  of  Lord  Cornwallis,  a  lesson  never  to 
be  forgotten  was  taught  to  Governors -General,  and 
at  the  same  time  the  political  danger  from  the  con- 
nection with  India  passed  away. 

England  had  broken  the  toils  that  threatened  to 


V    MUTUAL  INFLUENCE  OF  ENGLAND  AND  INDIA    291 

imprison  her.  But  liow  far  was  she,  who  had  so 
stoutly  refused  to  be  influenced  by  India,  entitled  to 
influence  India  in  her  turn  1  We  could  not  fail  to  see 
the  enormous  difference  between  our  civilisation  and 
that  of  India ;  we  could  not  fail  on  the  whole  greatly 
to  prefer  our  own.  But  had  we  any  right  to  impose 
our  views  upon  the  natives?  We  had  our  own 
Christianity,  our  own  views  of  philosophy,  of  history 
and  science ;  but  were  we  not  bound  by  a  sort  of 
tacit  contract  with  the  natives  to  hold  all  these  things 
officially  in  abeyance  1  This  was  the  view  which  was 
taken  at  first.  It  was  not  admitted  that  England 
was  to  play  the  part  of  Eome  to  her  empire ;  no ; 
she  was  to  put  her  civilisation  on  one  side  and  govern 
according  to  Indian  ideas.  This  view  was  the  more 
winning  as  the  new  and  mysterious  world  of  Sanscrit 
learning  was  revealing  itself  to  those  first  generations 
of  Anglo-Indians.  They  were  under  the  charm  of  a 
remote  philosophy  and  a  fantastic  history.  They 
were,  as  it  was  said,  Brahminised,  and  would  not 
hear  of  admitting  into  their  enchanted  Oriental  en- 
closure either  the  Christianity  or  any  of  the  learning 
of  the  West. 

I  have  not  space  left  in  this  lecture  to  do  more 
than  indicate  how  we  were  gradually  led  to  give  up 
this  view  and  to  stand  out  boldly  as  teachers  and 
civilisers.  The  change  began  in  1813,  when,  on  the 
renewal  of  the  Company's  charter,  a  sum  was  directed 
to  be  appropriated  to  the  revival  of  learning  and  the 
introduction  of  useful  arts  and  sciences.  Over  this 
enactment  an   Education    Committee    wrangled   for 


292  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

twenty  years.  Were  we  to  use  our  own  judgments, 
or  were  we  to  understand  learning  and  science  in  the 
Oriental  sense  1  Were  we  to  teach  Sanscrit  and 
Arabic,  or  English  1 

Never  on  this  earth  was  a  more  momentous  ques- 
tion discussed.  Under  Lord  William  Bentinck  in 
1835  the  discussion  came  to  a  head,  and  by  a  re- 
markable coincidence  a  famous  man  was  on  the  spot 
to  give  lustre  to  and  take  lustre  from  a  memorable 
controversy.  It  was  Macaulay's  Minute  that  decided 
the  question  in  favour  of  English.  In  that  Minute 
or  in  Sir  C.  Trevelyan's  volume  on  Education  in 
India  you  can  study  it.  Only  remark  a  strange 
oversight  that  was  made.  The  question  was  dis- 
cussed as  if  the  choice  lay  between  teaching  Sanscrit 
and  Arabic  on  the  one  hand,  or  English  on  the  other. 
All  these  languages  alike  are  to  the  mass  of  the 
population  utterly  strange.  Arabic  and  English  are 
foreign,  and  Sanscrit  is  to  the  Hindus  what  Latin  is 
to  the  natives  of  Europe.  It  is  the  original  language 
out  of  which  the  principal  spoken  languages  have 
been  formed,  but  it  is  dead.  It  has  been  dead  a  far 
longer  time  than  Latin,  for  it  had  ceased  to  be  a 
spoken  language  in  the  third  century  before  Christ. 
By  far  the  greater  part  of  the  famous  Sanscrit  poems 
and  writings,  philosophical  or  theological,  were 
written  artificially  and  by  a  learned  efi'ort,  like  the 
Latin  poems  of  Vida  and  Sannazaro.  Now  over 
Sanscrit  Macaulay  had  an  easy  victory,  for  he  had 
only  to  show  that  English  had  poetry  at  least  aa 
good,  and  philosophy,  history,  and  science  a  great  deal 


V    MUTUAL  INFLUENCE  OF  ENGLAND  AND  INDIA    293 

better.  But  why  should  there  be  no  choice  but 
between  dead  languages?  Could  Macaulay  really 
fancy  it  possible  to  teach  two  hundred  and  fifty 
millions  of  Asiatics  Enghsh  1  Probably  not,  probably 
he  thought  only  of  creating  a  small  learned  class.  I 
imagine  too  that  his  own  classical  training  had 
implanted  in  his  mind  a  fixed  assumption  that  a  dead 
language  is  necessary  to  education.  But  if  India  is 
really  to  be  enlightened,  evidently  it  must  be  through 
the  medium  neither  of  Sanscrit  nor  of  English,  but  of 
the  vernaculars — that  is,  Hindustani,  Hindi,  Bengali, 
etc.  These,  under  some  vague  impression  that  they 
were  too  rude  to  be  made  the  vehicles  of  science  or 
philosophy,  Macaulay  almost  refuses  to  consider,  but 
against  these  his  arguments  in  favour  of  English 
would  have  been  powerless. 

But  though  this  great  oversight  was  made — it  has 
since  been  remarked  and,  since  the  education  despatch 
of  Sir  Charles  Wood  in  1854,  in  some  measure 
repaired — the  decision  to  which  Macaulay's  Minute 
led  remains  the  great  landmark  in  the  history  of  our 
Empire,  considered  as  an  institute  of  civilisation.  It 
marks  the  moment  when  we  deliberately  recognised 
that  a  function  had  devolved  on  us  in  Asia  similar  to 
that  which  Eome  fulfilled  in  Europe,  the  greatest 
function  which  any  Government  can  ever  be  called 
upon  to  discharge. 


LECTURE  VI 

PHASES    IN   THE   CONQUEST   OF   INDIA 

The  sum  of  what  I  have  laid  before  you  up  to  this 
point  is  that  in  India  a  result  has  been  produced  by 
causes  less  wonderful  than  is  commonly  supposed, 
which  result  is  in  magnitude  more  wonderful,  and  in 
the  consequences  which  may  possibly  flow  from  it  far 
more  wonderful  and  great,  than  is  imagined.  But  in 
showing  how  such  a  result  could  be  produced  without 
a  miracle  I  have  laid  stress  upon  another  peculiarity 
of  this  Empire,  which  is  of  fundamental  importance, 
namely  the  slightness  of  the  machinery  which  con- 
nects it  with  England.  Let  us  now  remark  that  in 
this  respect  our  Indian  Empire  resembles  our  colonies. 
There  is  of  course  this  vast  difference,  that  our  chief 
colonies  determine  in  most  matters  their  own  policy 
through  Governments  which  spring  up  by  a  constitu- 
tional process  out  of  the  colonial  assembly,  and  that 
India  has  no  such  independent  initiative,  the  Viceroy 
himself  being  liable  to  be  overruled  by  the  Indian 
Secretary  at  home.     But  at  the  same  time  there  is 


LECT.  VI     PHASES  IN  THE  CONQUEST  OF  INDIA  295 

this  great  resemblance,  that  India,  like  the  colonies, 
has  been  held  at  arm's  length,  that  its  Government 
has  never  been  suffered  to  approach  the  Home 
Government  so  closely  as  to  blend  with  it,  or  to 
modify  its  character,  or  to  hamper  its  independent 
development.  India  is  both  constitutionally  and 
financially  an  independent  Empire.  If  the  Empire 
of  the  Great  Mogul  had  continued  in  its  original 
vigour  up  to  the  present  time,  no  doubt  in  foreign 
affairs  the  history  of  England  would  differ  consider- 
ably from  what  it  is.  Several  of  our  wars  with 
France  would  have  taken  a  different  turn,  especially 
that  war  of  which  the  Egyptian  expedition  of  Bona- 
parte was  a  main  incident.  We  can  imagine  too 
that  the  Crimean  War  would  not  have  happened, 
and  that  we  should  not  have  taken  the  interest  we 
did  in  the  recent  Eusso-Turkish  war.  But  the  con- 
stitution of  the  English  state  would  have  been 
precisely  what  it  is,  and  our  domestic  history  would 
have  run  almost  exactly  the  same  course.  Only 
once,  I  think,  namely  in  1783,  has  India  come  quite 
into  the  foreground  of  parliamentary  debate  and 
absorbed  the  attention  of  the  political  world.  Even 
in  the  Mutiny  of  1857,  deeply  as  our  feelings  were 
stirred,  the  course  of  home  politics  was  not  aflFectcd 
by  the  affairs  of  India. 

Accordingly  if  the  Indian  Empire  were  lost,  the 
immediate  and  purely  political  effects  of  the  change 
would  not  be  great.  A  Secretaryship  of  State  avouUI 
disappear ;  the  work  of  Parliament  would  be  lightened. 
Our   foreign   policy  would   be   relieved   of   a   great 


296  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

burden  of  anxiety.  Otherwise  little  would  immedi- 
ately be  changed.  In  this  respect  I  say  the  Indian 
Empire  resembles  the  colonies,  and  we  are  led  to 
perceive  a  universal  characteristic  of  that  expansion 
of  England  which  is  the  subject  of  these  lectures.  I 
have  remarked  before  that  this  expansion  does  not 
seem  at  first  sight  to  be  of  the  nature  of  organic 
growth.  When  the  boy  expands  into  the  man,  the 
boy  disappears.  He  does  not  increase  hy  an  accretion 
visibly  different  from  the  original  boy  and  attached 
to  him  so  as  to  be  easily  peeled  off.  But  it  is  in 
such  a  way  that  England  seems  to  have  increased. 
For  the  original  England  remains  distinctly  visible  at 
the  heart  of  Greater  Britain,  she  still  forms  a  distinct 
organism  complete  in  herself,  and  she  has  not  even 
formed  the  habit  of  thinking  of  her  colonies  and  her 
Indian  Empire  along  with  herself. 

Turgot  compared  colonies  to  fruit  which  hangs  on 
the  tree  only  till  it  is  ripe.  And  indeed  it  might 
seem  natural  to  picture  the  aggregate  of  English 
communities  rather  as  a  family  than  as  an  individual. 
We  may  say  that  the  England  of  Queen  Elizabeth's 
time  has  now  a  large  family  scattered  over  distant 
seas,  that  this  family  consists  for  the  most  part  of 
thriving  colonies,  but  that  it  includes  also  a  corpor- 
ation which  had  the  good  luck  in  the  course  of  its 
trade  to  become  ruler  of  a  vast  country.  There  is 
no  objection  to  such  an  image,  provided  it  is  regarded 
only  as  an  image,  and  is  not  converted  by  sleight  of 
hand  into  an  argument.  But  we  know  that  a  family, 
at  least  in  the  present  state  of  society,  is  always 


VI  PHASES  IN  THE  CONQUEST  OF  INDIA  297 

tending  towards  practical  dissolution.  It  is  a  close 
union  so  long  as  the  children  are  young ;  it  becomes 
a  federation,  and  at  last  a  loose  federation,  as  they 
grow  up ;  finally,  in  the  present  state  of  society,  as 
the  grown-up  sons  disperse  or  emigrate  in  quest  of  a 
livelihood  and  the  daughters  are  married,  it  often 
ceases  practically  to  be  a  federation  or  even  a  perma- 
nent alliance.  Now  we  may  call  our  Empire  a 
family,  but  we  must  not  without  further  investi- 
gation assume  that  it  will  have  the  fate  which  cannot 
even  be  said  generally  to  attend  literal  families,  but 
which  attends  them  in  the  very  peculiar  form  of 
society  in  which  we  happen  to  live.  The  dissolving 
causes  which  act  upon  families  do  not  act  in  an  equal 
degree  upon  states,  and,  what  is  especially  to  be 
observed,  they  do  not  act  upon  them  nearly  so  much  as 
they  used  to  do.  In  the  time  of  Turgot  and  of  the 
American  Revolution  there  was  much  force  in  the 
comparison  between  a  distant  dependency  and  a  son 
who  had  left  home  and  so  practically  passed  out  of 
the  family.  But  there  is  much  less  force  in  it  at  the 
present  day,  when  inventions  have  drawn  the  whole 
globe  close  together,  and  a  new  form  of  state  on  a 
larger  scale  than  was  known  in  former  ages  has 
appeared  in  Russia  and  the  United  States. 

This  consideration  should  make  us  hesitate  in 
drawing  the  obvious  coiiclusion  from  the  great  fact 
that  the  connection  of.  England  with  her  colonies  and 
her  Indian  Empire  has  been  all  along  so  remarkably 
slight.  Above  I  pointed  out  with  respect  to  the 
colonies    that,    though   their    connection    with    the 


298  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LECT. 

mother-country  was  loose  at  the  outset,  so  that  the 
secession  of  the  American  colonies  was  a  natural 
effect  of  the  causes  then  in  operation,  yet  the  connec- 
tion does  not  steadily  grow  slighter  and  slighter,  but 
on  the  contrary  increases  and  becomes  closer.  The 
colonies  have  practically  approached  much  nearer 
to  us,  all  that  was  invidious  in  the  old  colonial 
system  has  been  repealed,  and  they  have  now 
become  a  natural  outlet  for  a  superfluous  popula- 
tion, whereas  in  the  old  time,  when  there  was  as 
yet  no  surplus  population,  they  were  peopled 
principally  by  discontented  refugees,  who  bore  a 
grudge  against  the  country  they  had  left.  A 
similar  law  governs  our  connection  with  India, 
The  machinery  by  which  the  connection  is  main- 
tained is  slight.  England  has  not  allowed  herself  to 
be  hampered  by  her  relation  to  India.  Enormous  as 
the  dominion  is,  England  remains  Avhat  she  was 
before  she  acquired  it,  so  that,  as  I  have  said,  the 
connection  could  be  broken  any  day,  though  it  has 
lasted  a  hundred  years,  without  any  violent  wrench 
or  any  dislocation  in  our  domestic  system.  But  if  it 
be  inferred  from  this  that  a  connection  so  slight  must 
sooner  or  later  snap,  before  we  can  admit  such  an 
inference  we  must  consider  another  question.  In 
which  direction  is  the  tendency?  Does  the  slight 
connection  grow  looser  and  looser,  or  does  it  on  the 
other  hand  tighten  with  time  1  And  here  again,  as- 
in  the  case  of  the  colonies,  we  shall  find  that  the 
general  tendency  of  our  age,  which  brings  together 
what  is   remote   and   which   favours   large   political 


VI  PHASES  IN  THE  CONQUEST  OF  INDIA  299 

unions,  operates  to  strengthen  rather  than  to  weaken 
the  connection  between  England  and  India. 

Macculloch,  in  the  Note  on  India  in  his  edition  of 
Adam  Smith,  speaks  of  the  trade  between  England 
and  India  about  1811 — that  is,  in  the  days  of  the 
monopoly — as  being  utterly  insignificant,  of  little 
more  importance  than  that  between  England  and 
Jersey  or  the  Isle  of  Man.  Now  if  trade  be  one  of 
the  principal  bonds  which  unite  communities  together, 
we  shall  have  some  criterion  of  the  tendency,  and  of 
the  strength  of  the  tendency,  whether  towards  union 
or  towards  separation,  between  England  and  India,  by 
comparing  the  present  with  the  former  state  of  the 
trade  between  the  two  countries.  It  was  supposed  in 
old  times  that  the  Hindus  had  unaltetable  habits,  and 
therefore  that  they  would  never  become  consumers  of 
European  produce.  But  now  instead  of  Jersey  or  the 
Isle  of  Man  we  compare  our  trade  with  India  to  that 
with  the  United  States  and  France — that  is,  with  the 
greatest  commercial  communities — and  we  find  that 
though  indeed  we  receive  from  India  much  less  than 
from  them  (thirty-two  millions,  as  against  thirty-nine 
from  France  and  not  less  than  a  hundred  and  three 
from  America  in  1881),  yet  India  comes  next  to  them 
as  an  exporting  country,  and  on  the  other  hand 
India  heads  Franco  and  all  other  nations  except  the 
United  States  as  an  importer  from  England,  for  she 
took  in  the  same  year  twenty-nine  millions,  whereas 
the  countries  which  came  next — that  is,  Australia 
and  Germany — took  twenty -one  and  seventeen  re- 
spectively. 


300  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  i.ect. 

Now  here  is  a  prodigious  advance  which  has  been 
made  in  the  present  century,  and  it  measures,  you 
will  observe,  the  gradual  approach  of  the  two  popula- 
tions towards  each  other,  not  their  gradual  separation 
from  each  other.     And  thus,  though  politically  the 
direct    effects   of    disruption   would    not   be   great, 
economically  they  would  be  enormous.     For  we  are  to 
remember  that  it  is  owing  to  the  political  connection 
between  the  two  countries  that  this  commercial  inter- 
course has  been  allowed  to  exist,  and  that  it  would 
cease    perhaps  if     India  became   independent,   and 
certainly   if   she   passed  into  the  hands  of  another 
European  Power  such  as  Russia.     At  the  beginning 
of  the  century  indeed  we  might  have  severed  our- 
selves  from   India   with    little   anxiety,   and   those 
struggles  with  France  about  our  commercial  factories 
at  Madras,  Bombay,  and  Calcutta  may  seem  to  have 
had  no  sufficient  motive,  since  the  trade  carried  on  at 
those  stations  was  but  insignificant.     It  is  no  longer 
so;  the  commercial  stake  we  have  in  India  is  now 
very   large — that  is,  we  are  more  closely  bound  to 
India  than   we   were.      Look    again   at   the   moral 
approach    that  England   has   made    towards    India 
during  the  same   time.     Originally  we  had  no  sort 
of  interest  in  the  affairs  of  the  Hindus  among  whom 
we  had  stationed  commercial  agencies.     The  Mogul 
Empire  or  the  dissolution  of  the  Mogul  Empire  did 
not  concern  us.     It  was  no  affair  of  ours  whether  the 
Hindus  had  a  bad  Government,  or  had  no  Govern- 
ment  at   all   and  were  merely  the   prey  of   armed 
plunderers.     Even  when  we  began  to  conquer  them, 


VI  PHASES  IN  THE  CONQUEST  OF  INDIA  301 

it  was  not  on  their  account  but  partly  to  resist  the 
French,  partly  to  protect  our  factories  from  sudden 
attack.  For  a  long  time  after  the  Company  had 
become  a  sovereign  Power,  this  indifference  on  our 
part  to  the  welfare  of  the  natives  continued.  Adam 
Smith,  writing  in  the  eighties  or  about  the  end  of 
the  reign  of  Warren  Hastings,  says  that  there  never 
was  a  Government  so  wholly  indifferent  to  the  wel- 
fare of  its  subjects.  This  was  only  the  natural  conse- 
quence of  the  false  position  in  which  a  trading 
company  suddenly  turned  into  a  Government  found 
itself.  The  anomaly  and  the  effect  of  it  could  not 
but  last  as  long  as  the  Company.  But  since  1858  it 
has  been  removed.  The  very  appearance  of  a  selfish 
object  is  gone.  The  Government  is  now  as  sincerely 
paternal  as  any  Government  can  be,  and,  as  I  ex- 
plained, it  has  abandoned  the  affectation  of  not  impart- 
ing the  superior  enlightenment  we  know  ourselves  to 
possess  on  the  ground  that  the  Hindus  do  not  want  it. 
At  the  same  time  the  introduction  of  the  tele- 
graph and  the  shortening  of  the  voyage  to  India, 
first  by  the  overland  route  and  since  by  the  Suez 
Canal,  has  brought  India  much  more  within  reach  of 
England.  It  has  often  been  contended  that  the 
effect  of  this  change  is  bad,  that  the  constant  inter- 
ference of  Downing  Street  and  still  more  of  English 
public  opinion  is  mischievous.  Let  this  be  granted 
for  argument's  sake.  Whether  it  be  desirable  or 
undesirable  that  India  should  be  more  closely  united 
with  England,  is  not  now  the  question.  What  con- 
cerns us  at  present  is  the  fact  that,  for  good  or  for 


302  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

evil,  the  connection  of  England  with  India  does  not 
diminish  but  increases. 

Once  more,  let  us  remark  the  speed  with  which 
our  intercourse  with  India  increases.  Mr.  Cunning- 
ham in  his  volume  lately  published,  entitled  British 
India  and  its  Rulers,  compares  the  increase  of  the 
foreign  trade  of  India  between  1820  and  1880  with 
that  of  the  foreign  trade  of  Great  Britain  itself  in 
the  same  period.  This  last  increase  has  often  excited 
astonishment :  English  foreign  trade  rose  from  about 
80  to  about  650  millions  sterling.  But  Mr.  Cunning- 
ham points  out  that  the  increase  of  Indian  trade  in 
the  same  period  has  been  even  greater,  and,  as  of 
course  the  foreign  trade  of  India  is  principally  with 
England,  it  follows  that  the  tendency  to  commercial 
union  between  the  two  countries  is  prodigiously  strong, 
so  that  fifty  years  hence,  if  no  catastrophe  takes 
place,  the  union  will  be  infinitely  closer  than  it  is  now. 

If  we  combine  all  the  facts  I  have  hitherto  ad- 
duced in  order  to  form  a  conception  of  our  Indian 
Empire  the  result  is  very  singular.  An  Empire 
similar  to  that  of  Rome,  in  which  we  hold  the 
position  not  merely  of  a  ruling  but  of  an  educating 
and  civilising  race  (and  thus,  as  in  the  marriage  of 
Faust  with  Helen  of  Greece,  one  age  is  married  to 
another,  the  modern  European  to  the  medieval 
Asiatic  spirit) ;  this  Empire  held  at  arm's  length, 
paying  no  tribute  to  us,  yet  costing  nothing  except 
through  the  burden  it  imposes  on  our  foreign  policy, 
and  neither  modifying  nor  perceptibly  influencing 
our  busy  domestic  politics ;  this  Empire  nevertheless 


TI  PHASES  IN  THE  CONQUEST  OF  INDIA  303 

held  firmly  and  with  a  grasp  which  does  not  slacken 
but  visibly  tightens ;  the  union  of  England  and  India, 
ill-assorted  and  unnatural  as  it  might  seem  to  be, 
nevertheless  groAving  closer  and  closer  with  great 
rapidity  under  the  influence  of  the  modern  condi- 
tions of  the  world,  which  seem  favourable  to  vaot 
political  unions ;  all  this  makes  up  the  strangest, 
most  curious,  and  perhaps  most  instructive  chapter  of 
English  history.  It  has  been  made  the  subject  of 
much  empty  boasting,  while  those  who  have  looked 
deeper  have  often  been  disposed  to  regard  the  whole 
enterprise  with  despondency,  as  a  kind  of  romantic 
adventure  which  can  lead  to  nothing  permanent. 
But,  as  time  passes,  it  rather  appears  that  we  are  in 
the  hands  of  a  Providence  which  is  greater  that  all 
statesmanship,  that  this  fabric  so  blindly  piled  up 
has  a  chance  of  becoming  a  part  of  the  permanent 
edifice  of  civilisation,  and  that  the  Indian  achieve- 
ment of  England  as  it  is  the  strangest,  may  after  all 
turn  out  to  be  the  greatest,  of  all  her  achievements. 

At  this  point  again  we  are  led  to  turn  our  eyes 
from  the  present  to  the  past,  and  to  inquire  how  it 
could  happen  to  us  to  undertake  such  an  enterprise. 
I  devoted  a  lecture  to  the  historical  question  by  what 
force  we  were  able  to  subdue  the  people  of  India 
to  our  government;  but  this  question  is  different. 
That  was  the  question,  how  1  this  is  the  question, 
why  1  We  see  that  without  any  supernatural  force 
or  genius  it  was  possible  to  raise  such  an  Empire,  but 
what  was  the  motive  which  impelled  us  to  do  it? 
How  many  lives,  some  of  them   noble   and  heroic, 


304  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

many  of  them  most  laborious,  have  been  spent  in 
piling  up  this  structure  of  empire !  Why  did  they 
do  it  ?  Or  if  they  themselves  looked  no  further  than 
their  instructions,  what  was  the  motive  of  the 
authority  that  gave  them  their  instructions  ?  If  this 
was  the  Company,  why  did  the  Company  desire  to 
conquer  India,  and  what  could  they  gain  by  doing  so  1 
If  it  was  the  English  Government,  what  could  be  its 
object,  and  how  could  it  justify  such  an  undertaking 
to  Parliament  1  We  may  have  been  at  times  too  war- 
like, but  the  principal  wars  we  have  waged  have  borne 
the  appearance  at  least  of  being  defensive.  Naked 
conquest  for  its  own  sake  has  never  had  attractions 
for  us.     What  then  did  we  propose  to  ourselves  1 

The  English  Government  assuredly  has  gained 
nothing  through  this  acquisition,  for  if  it  has  not 
hampered  their  budgets  by  the  expense  of  con- 
quest, on  the  other  band  it  has  not  lightened  them 
by  any  tribute.  If  we  hope  to  discover  the  guilty 
party  by  the  old  plan  of  asking  Cui  bono  1  that  is, 
Who  profited  by  it?  the  answer  must  be,  English 
commerce  has  profited  by  it.  We  have  here  a  great 
foreign  trade,  which  may  grow  to  be  enormous,  and 
this  trade  is  secured  to  us  so  long  as  we  are  masters 
of  the  Government  of  India.  Here  no  doubt  is  a 
substantial  acquisition,  which  stands  us  in  good  stead 
now  that  we  find  by  experience  how  tenacious  of  pro- 
tection foreign  Governments  are.  May  it  then  be 
assumed  that  this  trade  has  been  our  sole  object  all 
along  ? 

The  hypothesis  is  plausible,  and  it  is  made  more 


VI  PHASES  IN  THE  CONQUEST  OF  INDIA  305 

plausible  still  when  we  remark  that  our  Empire  began 
evidently  in  commerce.  To  defend  our  factories  and 
for  no  other  purpose  we  took  arms  in  the  first 
instance.  Our  first  wars  in  India,  as  they  belong  to 
the  same  time,  so  belong  evidently  to  the  same  class, 
as  our  colonial  wars  with  France.  They  were  pro- 
duced by  the  same  great  cause  on  which  I  have 
insisted  so  much,  the  competition  of  the  Western 
states  for  the  wealth  of  the  regions  discovered  in  the 
fifteenth  century.  We  had  trade-settlements  in  India 
as  we  had  trade-settlements  in  America.  In  both 
countries  we  encountered  the  same  rivals,  the  French. 
In  both  countries  English  and  French  traders  shook 
their  fists  at  each  other  from  rival  commercial  stations. 
In  America  our  New  England  and  Virginia  stood 
opposed  to  their  Acadie  and  Canada ;  and  similarly 
our  Madras,  Calcutta,  and  Bombay  stood  opposed 
in  India  to  their  Pondicherry,  Chandernagore,  and 
Mahee. 

The  crisis  came  in  America  and  India  at  once 
between  1740  and  1760,  when  in  two  wars  divided 
by  a  very  hollow  and  imperfect  peace  these  two 
states  struggled  for  supremacy,  and  in  both  quarters 
England  was  victorious.  From  victory  over  France 
in  India  we  proceeded  without  a  pause  to  empire 
over  the  Hindus.  This  fact,  combined  with  the 
other  fact,  equally  striking,  of  the  great  trade  which 
now  exists  between  England  and  India,  leads  very 
naturally  to  a  theory  that  our  Indian  Empire  has 
grown  up  from  first  to  last  out  of  the  spirit  of  trade. 
We  may  imagine  that  after  having  estabhshed  our 
X 


306  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

settlements  on  the  coast  and  defended  these  settle- 
ments both  from  the  native  Powers  and  from  the 
envy  of  the  French,  we  then  conceived  the  ambition 
of  extending  our  commerce  further  inland ;  that 
perhaps  we  met  with  new  states,  such  as  Mysore  or 
the  Mahratta  Confederacy,  which  at  first  were  un- 
willing to  trade  with  us,  but  that  in  our  eager  avarice 
we  had  recourse  to  force,  let  loose  our  armies  upon 
them,  broke  down  their  custom-houses  and  flooded 
their  territories  in  turn  with  our  commodities ;  that 
in  this  way  we  gradually  advanced  our  Indian  trade, 
which  at  first  was  insignificant,  until  it  became  con- 
siderable, and  at  last,  when  we  had  not  only  intimi- 
dated but  actually  overthrown  every  great  nativa 
Government,  when  there  was  no  longer  any  Great 
Mogul,  or  any  Sultan  of  Mysore,  or  any  Peishwa  of 
the  Mahrattas,  or  any  Nawab  Vizir  of  Oude,  or  any 
Maharajah  and  Khalsa  of  the  Sikhs,  then,  all 
restraints  having  been  removed,  our  trade  became 
enormous. 

But  it  will  be  found  on  closer  examination  that 
the  facts  do  not  answer  to  this  theory.  True  it  is 
that  our  Empire  began  in  trade,  and  that  lately  there 
has  been  an  enormous  development  of  trade.  But  the 
course  of  affairs  in  history  is  not  necessarily  a  straight 
line,  so  that  when  any  two  points  in  it  are  determined 
its  whole  course  is  known.  The  truth  is  that  if  the 
spirit  of  English  trade  had  been  thus  irrepressible  and 
bent  upon  overcoming  all  the  obstacles  which  lay  in 
its  path,  it  would  not  have  raised  wars  in  India,  for 
the  main  obstacle  was  not  there.     The  main  obstacle 


VI  PHASES  IN  THE  CONQUEST  OF  INDIA  307 

to  English  trade  was  not  the  jealousy  of  native 
Princes,  but  the  jealousy  of  the  East  India  Company 
itself.  Accordingly  there  has  been  no  correspondence 
in  time  between  the  increase  of  trade  and  the  advance 
of  conquest. 

Our  trade  on  the  contrary  continued  to  be  in- 
significant in  spite  of  all  our  conquests  until  about 
1813,  and  it  began  to  advance  with  great  rapidity 
soon  after  1830.  These  dates  point  to  the  true  cause 
of  progress  in  trade,  and  they  show  that  it  is  wholly 
independent  of  progress  in  conquest,  for  they  are  the 
dates  of  the  successive  Acts  of  Parliament  by  which 
the  Company  was  deprived  of  its  monopoly.  Thus 
it  appears  that,  while  it  was  by  the  East  India 
Company  that  India  was  conquered,  it  was  not  by 
the  East  India  Company,  but  rather  by  the  de- 
struction of  the  East  India  Company,  that  the  great 
trade  with  India  was  brought  into  existence.  Our 
conquests  in  India  were  made  by  an  exclusive 
chartered  Company,  but  our  Indian  trade  did  not 
greatly  prosper  until  that  Company  ceased  practically 
to  exist. 

In  order  to  make  this  clearer,  it  will  be  convenient 
here  to  give  such  an  outline  of  the  history  of  the  East 
India  Company  as  may  mark  the  principal  stages  of 
its  progress  and  those  alone.  The  East  India  Com- 
pany then  came  into  existence  in  the  year  1600 — 
that  is,  near  the  end  of  Queen  Elizabeth's  reign.  In 
the  view  we  are  now  taking  of  the  expansion  of 
England  it  deserves  note  that  this  occurrence  took 
place  just  at  that  time  and  at  no  time  either  earlier 


308  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

or  later.  England,  we  have  seen,  assumed  its 
modern — that  is,  its  maritime  and  oceanic — character 
about  the  time  of  the  Spanish  Armada,  since  it  was 
then  that  its  first  race  of  naval  heroes  appeared,  and 
then  too  that  it  made  its  first  attempts  to  colonise 
America.  If  this  general  statement  be  true,  we 
ought  to  look  in  this  period  also  for  our  first  settle- 
ments in  India.  Just  in  this  period  we  find  them, 
for  the  creation  of  the  East  India  Company  took 
place  twelve  years  after  the  defeat  of  the  Armada. 

It  was  created  for  trade,  and  it  remained  devoted 
to  trade  for  a  hundred  and  forty-eight  years.  During 
this  period  several  important  occurrences  in  its 
history  took  place,  but  none  so  important  as  to 
deserve  our  attention  here.  It  was  in  1748  that  the 
disturbances  occurred  in  the  Deccan  which  forced  the 
Company  to  undertake  on  a  considerable  scale  the 
functions  of  government  and  war.  Then  began  its 
second  and  memorable  period,  which  is  nearly  as 
long  as  the  first ;  it  embraces  a  hundred  and  ten  years 
and  ends  with  the  abolition  of  the  Company  by  Act 
of  Parliament  in  1858.  It  is  this  second  period  alone 
with  which  we  are  concerned  at  present.  In  order 
to  understand  the  course  of  development,  we  must 
endeavour  to  subdivide  it. 

It  happens  accidentally  that  there  is  a  certain 
regularity  in  the  course  of  events  over  a  great  part 
of  this  period,  which  rarely  occurs  in  history  and 
which  is  very  helpful  to  the  memory.  The  Company 
being  dependent  on  Parliament  for  a  renewal  of  its 
Charter,  and  its  affairs  having  since  1748  taken  such 


VI  PHASES  IN  THE  CONQUEST  OF  INDIA  309 

a  strange  turn,  it  was  natural  that  Parliament  should 
grant  the  renewal  only  for  a  definite  term,  and  at  the 
end  of  the  term  should  reconsider  the  condition  of 
the  Company  and  make  alterations  in  its  organisa- 
tion. In  this  way  the  Company  became  subject  to  a 
transformation,  which  was  strictly  periodic  and  re- 
curred at  absolutely  equal  intervals.  These  intervals 
were  of  the  length  of  twenty  years,  beginning  with 
Lord  North's  Regulating  Act  in  1773.  If  then  we 
bear  this  date  in  mind,  we  acquire  at  the  same  time 
four  other  dates  which  of  necessity  are  of  primary 
importance  in  the  history  of  the  Company.  These 
are  1793,  1813,  1833,  and  1853. 

We  shall  find  these  five  dates  quite  as  important 
as  we  might  expect,  and  they  form  a  very  convenient 
framework  for  the  history  of  the  Company.  The 
first  is  one  of  the  most  important  of  all.  If  1748 
marks  the  beginning  of  the  movement  which  led  to 
the  creation  of  British  India,  1773  may  be  said  to 
mark  the  creation  itself  of  British  India.  In  that 
year  began  the  line  of  Governors-General,  though  for 
a  long  time  they  had  not  the  title  of  Governor- 
General  of  India  but  only  of  Bengal ;  then  too  was 
founded  the  Supreme  Court  of  Calcutta.  The 
enormous  danger  which  attended  the  new  state  of 
our  Indian  affairs  was  at  the  same  time  met,  and  the 
root  of  corruption  cut  through,  by  the  abolition  of 
the  power  in  the  Company's  affairs  of  the  share- 
holders or  so-called  Proprietors. 

The  next  renewal  in  1793  is  less  important, 
though    the    debates   which    then   took    place    are 


310  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

interesting  now  for  the  picture  they  present  of  the 
phase  of  Anglo-Indian  life  when  it  was  hrahminised, 
when  the  attempt  was  made  to  keep  India  as  a 
kind  of  inviolate  paradise,  into  which  no  European 
and  especially  no  missionary  should  be  suffered  to 
penetrate.  But  the  date  1793  is  itself  as  important 
as  any  other,  being  the  date  not  merely  of  a  renewal 
of  the  Charter,  but  also  of  the  famous  Permanent 
Settlement  of  Bengal,  one  of  the  most  memorable 
acts  of  legislation  in  the  history  of  the  world. 

It  was  at  the  next  renewal  in  1813  that  the  aged 
Warren  Hastings,  then  in  his  eightieth  year,  came 
from  his  retirement  to  give  evidence  before  the 
House  of  Commons.  This  date  marks  the  moment 
when  the  monopoly  begins  to  crumble  away,  when 
the  brahminical  period  comes  to  an  end,  and  England 
prepares  to  pour  the  civilisation,  Christianity,  and 
science  of  the  West  into  India. 

In  1833  the  monopoly  disappears,  and  the 
Company  may  perhaps  be  said  practically  to  have 
ceased  to  exist.  Henceforward  it  is  little  more  than 
a  convenient  organisation,  convenient  because  of  the 
tradition  it  represents  and  the  experience  which  it 
guards,  by  means  of  which  India  is  governed  from 
England.  At  this  time  too  the  systematic  legislative 
labours  of  our  Indian  Government  begin. 

Finally  1853  is  the  date  of  the  introduction  of  the 
system  of  appointment  by  competition.  That  old 
question  which  had  convulsed  England  in  1783  and 
which  statesmen  had  been  afraid  to  touch  since,  the 
question  who  should  have  the  patronage  of  India  or 


VI  PHASES  IN  THE  CONQUEST  OF  INDIA  311 

how  it  should  be  dispensed  without  shaking  the 
constitution  of  England,  was  in  this  way  solved. 

But  here  we  are  reminded  that  history  cannot  for 
a  very  long  time  proceed  in  this  regular  manner,  so 
convenient  to  our  memories.  The  convulsion  of 
1857  put  a  final  end  to  this  periodicity,  and  1873, 
the  centenary  of  the  Regulating  Act,  is  no  great 
Indian  date. 

It  appears  from  this  outline  that  1813  is  the 
year  when  the  monopoly  was  first  seriously  curtailed 
and  1833  the  year  when  it  was  destroyed.  Now 
Macculloch  when  he  speaks  of  the  utter  insignificance 
of  our  old  trade  with  India  has  before  him  the 
statistics  up  to  the  year  1811,  and  the  statistics  which 
show  so  vast  an  increase  in  the  modern  trade 
refer  to  the  years  after  1813,  and  especially  to  those 
after  1833.  In  other  words,  so  long  as  India  was  in 
the  hands  of  those  whose  object  was  trade,  the  trade 
remained  insignificant;  the  trade  became  great  and 
at  last  enormous,  when  India  began  to  be  governed 
for  itself  and  trade-considerations  to  be  disregarded. 
This  might  seem  a  paradox,  did  Ave  not  remember 
that  in  dismissing  trade-considerations  we  also  de- 
stroyed a  monopoly.  But  there  is  nothing  wonderful 
in  the  fact  that  an  exclusive  Company,  even  when  its 
first  object  is  trade,  carries  on  trade  languidly, 
nothing  wonderful  in  a  vast  trade  springing  up  as 
soon  as  the  shackles  of  monopoly  were  removed. 

On  the  other  hand  we  do  not  find  that  the  increase 
of  trade  corresponds  at  all  to  the  augmentation  of 
our  territorial  possessions  in  India. 


312  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lkct. 

There  have  been  four  great  rulers  in  India  to 
whom  the  German  title  of  Mehrer  des  Eeichs  or 
Increaser  of  the  Empire  might  be  given.  These 
are  Lord  Olive,  the  founder,  Lord  Wellesley,  Lord 
Hastings,  and  Lord  Dalhousie.  Roughly  it  may  be 
said  that  the  first  established  us  along  the  Eastern 
Coast  from  Calcutta  to  Madras ;  the  second  and 
third  overthrew  the  Mahratta  power  and  established 
us  as  lords  of  the  middle  of  the  country  and  of  the 
Western  side  of  the  peninsula ;  and  the  fourth,  be- 
sides consolidating  these  conquests,  gave  us  the 
north-west  and  carried  our  frontier  to  the  Indus. 
There  were  considerable  intervals  between  these 
conquests,  and  accordingly  they  fall  into  separate 
groups.  Thus  there  was  a  period  of  conquest  be- 
tween 1748  and  1765,  which  we  may  label  with  the 
name  of  Clive,  a  second  period  beginning  in  1798, 
which  may  be  said  to  have  lasted,  though  with  a 
long  pause,  till  about  1820 ;  this  period  may  bear  the 
names  of  Wellesley  and  Lord  Hastings ;  and  a  third 
period  of  war  between  1839  and  1850,  but  of  this  the 
first  part  was  unfortunate,  and  only  the  second  part 
led  to  conquests,  of  which  it  fell  to  Lord  Dalhousie 
to  reap  the  harvest. 

Now  there  was  no  correspondence  whatever  in 
time  between  these  territorial  advances  and  the 
advance  of  trade.  Thus  we  remarked  how  insignifi- 
cant the  trade  of  India  still  was  in  1811,  and  yet 
this  was  shortly  after  the  vast  annexations  of  Lord 
Wellesley.  On  the  other  hand  trade  took  a  great 
leap  about  1830,  and  this  is  one  of  the  peaceful  in- 


VI  PHASES  IN  THE  CONQUEST  OF  INDIA  313 

tervals  of  the  history.  About  the  time  of  the  mutiny 
annexation  almost  ceased,  and  yet  the  quarter 
of  a  century  in  which  no  conquests  have  been  made 
has  been  a  period  of  the  most  rapid  gi-owth  in  trade. 

And  thus  the  assertion  which  is  often  made,  and 
which  seems  to  be  suggested  by  a  rapid  survey  of  the 
history — the  assertion  namely  that  the  Empire  is  the 
mere  result  of  a  reckless  pursuit  of  trade — proves  to 
be  as  untrue  as  the  other  assertion  sometimes  made, 
that  it  is  the  result  of  a  reckless  spirit  of  military 
aggression. 

Our  first  step  to  empire  was  very  plainly  taken 
with  a  view  simply  of  defending  our  factories.  The 
Madras  Presidency  grew  out  of  an  effort,  which,  in 
the  first  instance,  was  quite  necessary,  to  protect  Fort 
St.  George  and  Fort  St.  David  from  the  French. 
The  Bengal  Presidency  grew  in  a  similar  way  out  of 
the  evident  necessity  of  protecting  Fort  William 
and  punishing  the  Mussulman  Nawab  of  Bengal, 
Surajah  Dowlah,  for  his  atrocity  of  the  Black  Hole. 

So  far  then  the  causation  is  clear.  In  the  period 
which  immediately  followed,  the  revolutionar}'  and 
corrupt  period  of  British  India,  it  is  undeniable  that 
we  were  hurried  on  by  mere  rapacity.  The  violent 
proceedings  of  Warren  Hastings  at  Benares,  in  Oude, 
and  Rohilcund,  were  of  the  nature  of  money-specula- 
tions. If  the  later  history  of  British  India  had  been 
of  the  same  kind,  our  Empire  might  fairly  be  said  to 
be  similar  to  the  Empire  of  the  Spanish  in  Hispaniola 
and  Peru,  and  to  have  sprung  entirely  out  of  the 
reckless  pursuit  of  gain. 


314  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

But  a  change  took  place  with  the  advent  of  Lord 
Cornwallis  in  1785.  Partly  by  the  example  of  his 
high  character,  partly  by  a  judicious  reform,  which 
consisted  in  making  the  salaries  of  the  servants  of  the 
Company  considerable  enough  to  remove  the  excuse 
for  corruption,  he  purged  the  service  of  its  immoral- 
ity. From  that  time  it  has  been  morally  respectable. 
Now  among  the  consequences  of  this  change  we 
might  expect,  if  gain  were  the  principal  inducement 
to  conquest,  to  see  the  aggressions  of  the  Company 
cease.  For  not  only  had  its  agents  from  this  time  a 
character  to  lose,  but  it  was  also  impossible  for  it  to 
engage  in  purely  wicked  enterprises  of  conquest, 
since  under  the  double  government  introduced  by 
Pitt  in  1784  it  would  have  had  to  make  the  English 
Ministry  its  accomplice.  Now  the  English  Ministry 
may  be  supposed  capable  of  crimes  of  ambition,  but 
hardly  of  corrupt  connivance  at  the  sordid  crimes  of 
a  trading-company. 

The  truth  is  that  from  the  time  of  Pitt's  India 
Bill  the  supreme  management  of  Indian  affairs  passed 
out  of  the  hands  of  the  Company.  Thenceforward 
therefore  an  enterprise  begun  for  purposes  of  trade 
fell  under  the  management  of  men  who  had  no 
concern  with  trade.  Thenceforward  two  English 
statesmen  divided  between  themselves  the  decision 
of  the  leading  Indian  questions,  the  President  of  the 
Board  of  Control  and  the  Governor-General,  and  as 
long  as  the  Company  lasted,  the  leading  position 
belonged  rather  to  the  Governor-General  than  to  the 
President  of   the  Board.     Now   it  was   under   this 


VI  PHASES  IN  THE  CONQUEST  OF  INDIA  315 

system  that  the  conquest  of  India  for  the  most  part 
was  made,  and  it  is  certain  that  in  this  period 
the  spirit  of  trade  did  not  preside  over  our  Indian 
affairs. 

"With  the  appearance  of  Lord  Wellesley  as 
Governor-General  in  1798  a  new  era  begins  in  Indian 
policy.  He  first  laid  down  the  theory  of  intervention 
and  annexation.  His  theory  was  afterwards  adopted 
by  Lord  Hastings,  who,  by  the  way,  before  he  be- 
came Governor-General  had  opposed  it.  Later  again 
it  was  adopted  with  a  kind  of  fanaticism  by  the  last 
of  the  Governors-General  who  ruled  in  the  time  of  the 
Company,  Lord  Dalhousie. 

Now  this  is  the  theory  which  led  to  the  conquest 
of  India.  I  have  not  left  myself  space  in  this  lecture 
to  examine  it.  I  can  only  say  that  it  does  not  aim  at 
increase  of  trade,  and  that  accordingly,  instead  of 
being  favoured,  it  was  usually  opposed  by  the  Com- 
pany. The  Company  resisted  Lord  "Wellesley  and 
censured  Lord  Hastings ;  if  they  were  strangely 
compliant  in  dealing  with  Lord  Dalhousie,  it  is  to  be 
remarked  that  in  his  time  the  directors  had  practically 
ceased  to  represent  a  trading  Company.  The  theory 
was  often  applied  in  a  most  high-handed  manner. 
Lord  Dalhousie  in  particular  stands  out  in  history 
as  a  ruler  of  the  type  of  Frederick  the  Great,  and  did 
deeds  which  are  almost  as  difficult  to  justify  as  the 
seizure  of  Silesia  or  the  Partition  of  Poland.  But 
these  acts,  if  crimes,  are  crimes  of  the  same  order 
as  those  of  Frederick,  crimes  of  ambition  and  of  an 
ambition  not  by  any  means  purely  selfish.     Neither 


316  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect.  vi 

he  nor  any  of  the  great  Governors-General  since 
Warren  Hastings  can  be  suspected  for  a  moment  of 
sordid  rapacity,  and  thus  we  see  that  our  Indian 
Empire,  though  it  began  in  trade  and  has  a  great 
trade  for  one  of  its  results,  yet  was  not  really  planned 
by  tradesmen  or  for  purposes  of  trade. 


LECTURE  VII 

INTERNAL   AND   EXTERNAL   DANGERS 

For  estimating  the  stability  of  an  Empire  there  are 
certain  plain  tests  which  the  political  student  ought 
to  have  at  his  fingers'  ends.  Of  these  some  are 
applied  to  its  internal  organisation,  and  some  to  its 
external  conditions,  just  as  an  insurance  company  in 
estimating  the  value  of  a  life  will  take  the  opinion  of 
the  medical  oflBcer,  who  will  feel  the  candidate's 
pulse  and  listen  to  his  heart,  but  they  will  also 
inquire  how  and  where  the  candidate  lives,  and 
whether  his  pursuits  or  habits  expose  him  to  any 
peculiar  risks  from  without.  Now  I  have  partly 
applied  the  internal  test.  The  internal  test  of  the 
vitality  of  a  state  consists  in  ascertaining  whether  or 
no  the  Government  rests  upon  a  solid  basis.  For  in 
every  state  besides  the  two  things  which  are  obvious 
to  all,  viz.  the  Government  and  the  governed,  there 
is  a  third  thing,  which  is  overlooked  by  most  of 
us,  and  yet  is  usually  not  difficult  to  distinguish, — I 
mean  the  power  outside  the  Government  which  holds 
the  Government  up.     This  power  may  be  slight  or 


318t  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LECT. 

it  may  be  substantial,  and  according  to  its  solidity, 
or  rather  according  to  the  ratio  of  its  strength 
to  that  of  the  powers  which  tend  to  overthrow 
the  Government,  is  that  Government's  chance  of 
duration.  Now  I  made  some  inquiry  into  the 
strength  of  the  supports  upon  which  the  Government 
in  India  rests,  but  rather  with  a  view  of  explaining 
how  it  stands  now  than  whether  it  is  likely  to  last 
a  long  time.  Let  us  reconsider  then  with  this 
other  object  the  conclusions  at  which  we  arrived. 

We  found  that  the  Government  did  not  rest,  as 
in  England,  upon  the  consent  of  the  people  or  of 
some  native  constituency,  which  has  created  the 
Government  by  a  constitutional  process.  The  Gov- 
ernment is  in  every  respect,  race,  religion,  habits, 
foreign  to  the  people.  There  is  only  one  body  of 
persons  of  which  we  can  positively  afl&rm  that 
without  its  support  the  Government  could  not  stand ; 
this  is  the  army.  Of  this  army  one  part  is  English, 
and  might  be  trusted  to  stand  by  the  Government  in 
all  circumstances,  but  it  is  less  than  a  third  part  of 
the  whole.  The  other  two-thirds  are  bound  to  us  by 
nothing  but  their  pay  and  the  feeling  of  honour 
which  impels  a  good  soldier  to  be  true  to  his  flag. 
This  is  our  visible  support.  Is  there  beyond  it  any 
moral  support  which,  though  invisible,  may  be 
reckoned  upon  as  substantial?  Here  is  a  question 
which  affords  room  for  much  difference  of  opinion. 
We  are  naturally  inclined  to  presume  that  the  bene- 
fits we  have  done  the  country  by  terminating  the 
chronic  anarchy  which  a  century  ago  was  tearing  it 


VII  INTERNAL  AND  EXTERNAL  DANGERS  319 

in  pieces,  and  by  introducing  so  many  evident  im- 
provements, must  have  convinced  all  classes  that  our 
Government  ought  to  be  supported.  But  such  a 
presumption  is  very  rash.  The  notion  of  a  piiblic 
good,  of  a  commonweal,  to  which  all  private  interests 
ought  to  be  subordinate,  is  one  which  we  have  no 
right  to  assume  to  be  current  in  such  a  population 
as  that  of  India.  It  seems  indeed  to  presuppose 
precisely  what  we  have  found  to  be  wanting — that  is, 
a  moral  unity  or  nationality  in  India.  This  being 
absent,  we  ought  to  presume  that,  instead  of  consid- 
ering what  benefits  our  rule  may  confer  upon  the 
country  in  general,  each  class  or  interest  inquires 
how  it  separately  is  affected  by  our  ascendency,  the 
Mussulman  how  his  religion,  the  Brahmin  how  his 
ancient  social  supremacy,  the  native  prince  how  his 
dignity,  is  aflfected  by  it.  The  great  benefit  which 
we  have  conferred  upon  the  country  at  large  in 
putting  down  general  plunder  and  the  omnipotence 
of  a  mercenary  soldiery,  is  enjoyed  perhaps  mainly 
by  a  class  which,  though  the  most  numerous,  yet  has 
little  influence  and  a  short  memory, — that  class  so 
characteristic  of  India,  the  small  cultivators  whose 
thoughts  are  absolutely  wrapt  up  in  the  difficult 
problem  of  existing,  Avhose  utmost  ambition  extends 
only  to  keeping  body  and  soul  together.  Those  who 
used  to  be  plundered,  tortured,  massacred  in  the 
chronic  wars,  ought  no  doubt  to  bless  us;  but  the 
plunderers,  the  murderers  are  not  likely  to  do  so ; 
and  these,  it  may  be,  form  the  more  influential  class. 
It  is  certain  in  fact  that  all  those  who  under  the  old 


320  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lbct. 

rule  of  the  Moguls  used  to  be  influential  in  India, 
those  who  used  to  monopolise  ofl&cial  posts,  those 
who  belong  to  the  race  which  used  to  rule  and 
represent  the  religion  which  used  to  dominate, — all 
those  therefore  whose  opinion  of  us  might  be  expected 
to  be  politically  important, — have  suffered  by  our 
ascendency ;  and  that  all  our  philanthropic  attempts 
to  raise  the  native  races  have  had  the  effect  of  de- 
pressing them,  and  that  to  such  an  extent  that  vast 
numbers  of  them  have  been  reduced  to  the  greatest 
distress.  The  subject  has  been  discussed  in  Dr. 
Hunter's  book  on  the  Mussulmans  of  India.  In 
these  circumstances  it  would  be  very  rash  to  assume 
that  any  gratitude,  which  may  have  been  aroused 
here  and  there  by  our  administration,  can  be  more 
than  sufficient  to  counterbalance  the  discontent  which 
we  have  excited  among  those  whom  we  have  ousted 
from  authority  and  influence. 

It  remains  then  that  our  power  rests  on  an  army, 
and  on  an  army  of  which  two-thirds  are  in  relation 
to  us  mere  mercenaries.  This  may  seem  a  slight 
support,  especially  for  so  vast  an  authority,  but  we 
are  to  consider  on  the  other  hand  what  is  the  force 
of  opposition  which  has  to  be  overcome.  And  we 
find  a  population  which  by  habit  and  long  tradition 
is  absolutely  passive,  which  has  been  dragonnaded 
by  foreign  military  Governments,  until  the  very 
conception  of  resistance  has  been  lost.  We  find  also 
a  population  which  has  no  sort  of  unity,  in  which 
nationalities  lie  in  layers,  one  under  another,  and 
languages   wholly   unlike    each   other    are    brought 


VII  INTERNAL  AND  EXTERNAL  DANGERS  321 

together  by  composite  dialects  caused  by  fusion.  In 
other  words  it  is  a  population  which  for  the  present 
is  wholly  incapable  of  any  common  action.  As  I 
said,  if  it  had  a  spark  of  that  corporate  life  which 
distinguishes  a  nation,  it  could  not  be  held  in  such  a 
grasp  as  we  lay  upon  it.  But  there  is  no  immediate 
prospect  of  such  a  corporate  life  springing  up  in  it. 
In  the  meanwhile  our  Government  seems  in  ordinary 
times  sufficiently  supported.  It  is  considerably 
stronger  in  many  respects  than  it  was  at  the  time  of 
the  mutiny.  The  proportion  of  English  to  native 
troops  in  the  army  is  larger,  and  many  precautions 
suggested  by  the  mutiny  itself  have  been  taken.  A 
mutiny  might  happen  again,  but  so  long  as  it  is  a 
mere  mutiny  there  seems  no  reason  why  it  should  be 
fatal  to  our  power.  The  native  troops  want  native 
leadership,  and  so  long  as  they  find  no  efi"ective 
support  in  the  people,  so  long  as  their  own  objects 
continue  to  be,  as  they  were  in  the  last  mutiny, 
wholly  unpatriotic  and  selfish,  so  long  as  they  can  be 
disbanded  and  replaced  by  another  native  army,  the 
position  looked  at  purely  from  within  seems  tolerably 
secure.  But  this  statement  at  the  same  time  brings 
to  light  certain  dangers.  In  the  first  place,  what  is 
said  of  the  passive  habits  of  the  native  population 
applies  only  to  the  Hindus.  The  Mussulmans  have 
in  great  part  difi"erent  habits  and  different  traditions. 
They  do  not  look  back  upon  centuries  of  submission, 
but  upon  a  period  not  so  long  past  when  they  were 
a  ruling  race.  Secondly  we  are  to  remember  that, 
much  as  unity  may  be  wanting,  one  kind  of  unity, 

Y 


322  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

that  of  religion,  is  not  wanting.  There  is  the 
powerful  and  active  unity  of  Islam ;  there  is  the  less 
active  but  still  real  unity  of  Brahminism.  In  Dr. 
Hunter's  book  on  the  Indian  Mussulmans  there  is  a 
chapter  entitled  "the  chronic  conspiracy  within  our 
territory,"  in  which  is  described  the  religious  agitation 
which,  under  the  influence  of  Wahabite  preachers, 
constantly  rouses  against  our  Government  (according 
to  Dr.  Hunter,  but  others  deny  this)  just  that  part 
of  the  population  which  has  the  proudest  memories, 
and  therefore  the  keenest  sense  of  indignation  against 
the  race  that  has  superseded  them.  Brahminism, 
though  a  tenacious,  is  a  much  less  inspiring  religion. 
Still  we  all  remember  the  greased  cartridges.  The 
mutiny  of  1857,  though  mainly  military,  yet  had  a 
religious  beginning.  It  shows  us  what  we  might  ex- 
pect if  the  vast  Hindu  population  came  to  believe  that 
their  religion  was  attacked.  And  we  are  to  bear  in 
mind  that  the  Hindu  religion  is  not,  like  the  Moham- 
medan, outside  the  region  which  science  claims  as  its 
own.  We  liave  always  declared  that  we  held  sacred 
the  principle  of  religious  toleration,  and  on  that  un- 
derstanding we  are  obeyed ;  but  what  if  the  Hindu 
should  come  to  regard  the  teaching  of  European 
science  as  being  of  itself  an  attack  on  his  religion  t 

Great  religious  movements  then  seem  less  im- 
probable than  a  nationality-movement.  On  the  other 
hand  the  religious  forces,  if  they  are  livelier, 
neutralise  each  other  more  directly.  Islam  ;i,nd 
Hinduism  confront  each  other,  the  one  stronger  in 
faith,  the   other   in  numbers,  and  create  a  sort  of 


VII  INTEKNAL  AND  EXTERNAL  DANGERS  323 

equilibrium.  Is  it  conceivable  that  we  may  some 
day  find  our  Christianity  a  reconciling  element 
between  ourselves  and  these  contending  religions? 
We  are  to  remember  that,  as  Islam  is  the  crudest 
expression  of  Semitic  religion,  Brahminism  on  the 
other  hand  is  an  expression  of  Aryan  thought. 
Now  among  the  religions  of  the  world  Christianity 
stands  out  as  a  product  of  the  fusion  of  Semitic  with 
Aryan  ideas.  It  may  be  said  that  India  and  Europe 
in  respect  of  religion  have  both  the  same  elements, 
but  that  in  India  the  elements  have  not  blended, 
while  in  Europe  they  have  united  in  Christianity. 
Judaism  and  classical  Paganism  were  in  Europe  at 
the  beginning  of  our  era  what  Mohammedanism  and 
Brahminism  are  now  in  India;  but  in  India  the 
elements  have  remained  separate,  and  have  only 
made  occasional  efforts  to  unite,  as  in  the  Sikh 
religion  and  in  the  religion  of  Akber.  In  Europe  a 
great  fusion  took  place  by  means  of  the  Christian 
Church,  which  fusion  has  throughout  modern  history 
been  growing  more  and  more  complete. 

Such  then  is  the  appearance  which  our  Empire 
wears,  when  it  is  looked  at  by  itself  and  with  reference 
only  to  the  internal  forces  which  play  upon  it  in 
India,  But  in  order  to  form  any  estimate  of  its 
chance  of  stability  it  is  equally  important  to  consider 
what  influences  affect  it  from  without. 

Few  countries  known  to  history  have  been  so 
isolated  as  India.  Between  Nearchus,  the  Admiral  of 
Alexander,  and  Vasco  da  Gama  no  European  com- 
mander navigated  the  Indian  Ocean,  but  the  Arabs 


324  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect, 

appear  to  have  made  naval  descents  on  Sind  as  early 
as  the  time  of  the  Caliph  Omar.  With  this  exception 
the  only  traceable  foreign  relation  of  India,  except 
towards  the  North,  has  been  with  Java,  and  here  the 
influence  went  forth  from  India,  for  we  find  in  the 
Kawi  language  of  Java  the  strongest  traces  both 
linguistic  and  literary  of  Hindu  influence.  What 
the  sea  is  to  the  peninsula,  that  to  the  plain  of  the 
Ganges  is  the  enormous  barrier  of  the  Himalaya.  It 
has  the  effect  of  making  India  practically  rather  an 
island  than  a  peninsula.  On  this  side  too  Indian 
influence  has  gone  forth  into  Central  Asia,  for  it  is  to 
the  north  and  the  east  that  Buddhism  went  forth  to 
make  its  extensive  conquests.  But  on  this  side  too 
there  have  been  no  political  relations,  no  wars  or 
invasions  of  which  we  have  any  authentic  knowledge, 
except  at  a  single  point. 

We  can  easily  imagine  therefore  that  the  isolation 
of  India  was  for  thousands  of  years  complete,  and 
indeed  the  natives  told  Alexander  the  Great,  when  he 
appeared  among  them,  that  they  had  never  been 
invaded  before. 

But  this  isolation  came  to  an  end  at  last,  because 
after  all  India  is  not  an  island.  It  has  one  vulnerable 
point.  There  is  one  point  at  which  the  mountain 
barrier  can  be  penetrated.  It  can  be  invaded  from 
Persia  or  from  Central  Asia  through  Afghanistan. 
Accordingly  the  whole  history  of  the  foreign  relations 
of  India  up  to  the  time  of  Vasco  da  Gama  centres  in 
Afghanistan.  We  may  reckon  perhaps  eight  great 
invasions  by  this  route. 


VII  INTERNAL  AND  EXTERNAL  DANGERS  325 

The  first  is  the  most  memorable  of  all,  but  no 
history  of  it  remains.  The  Aryan  race  must  have 
entered  by  this  route,  or  perhaps  we  may  say  that 
the  Aryan  race  must  have  come  into  existence  here. 
The  Afghans  themselves  are  Aryan  by  language,  and 
the  correspondence  in  certain  matters  between  the 
Zendavesta  of  Persia  and  the  Vedas  of  India  leads 
us  to  place  the  original  Aryan  home  of  the  Sanscrit- 
speaking  race  somewhere  on  the  frontier  of  India  and 
Persia. 

The  next  invasion  was  that  of  Alexander  the 
Great,  famous  enough  in  history,  for  it  first  threw 
open  the  door  of  India  to  the  Western  world.  But 
it  had  no  permanent  consequences,  since  the  Graeco- 
Bactrian  kingdom,  which  for  a  time  maintained  a 
footing  in  India,  came  to  an  end  in  the  second  century 
before  Christ. 

The  third  wants  a  history  almost  as  much  as  the 
first.  It  is  the  so-called  Scythian  invasion,  or  series 
of  invasions,  of  the  first  centuries  after  Christ.  All- 
important  as  it  is  to  students  of  Sanscrit  literature,  it 
need  not  detain  us  here. 

Then  comes  the  invasion  of  Mahmoud  of  Ghazni 
(a.d.  1001).  This  is  one  of  the  most  important, 
because  it  is  at  once  the  end  both  of  the  isolation  and 
of  the  independence  of  India,  and  also  what  may  be 
called  the  practical  discovery  of  India  for  the  rest 
of  the  world.  Mahmoud  is  to  India,  as  it  were, 
Columbus  and  Cortez  in  one.  Since  his  time  foreign 
domination  has  never  been  interrupted,  and  the  way 
to  India  through  the  Khyber  Pass  has  been  a  beaten 


326  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LECT. 

road  trodden  by  many  adventurers.  In  several 
respects  too  Mahmoud  is  a  precursor  of  the  Great 
Moguls.  He  is  by  birth  a  Turk,  he  has  a  petty 
throne  in  Afghanistan,  and  he  is  irresistibly  impelled 
to  the  conquest  of  India  by  his  Mussulman  faith  and 
by  the  near  neighbourhood  of  the  shrines  of  idolatry. 
In  all  these  points  he  resembles  Baber. 

The  fifth  great  invasion  was  that  of  Tamerlane  in 
1398.  It  was  purely  destructive,  but  has  an  import- 
ance of  its  own,  which  however  we  shall  understand 
better  when  we  are  in  a  condition  to  compare  it  with 
the  seventh  and  eighth  invasions. 

Then  comes  the  invasion  of  Baber  in  1524  and  the 
establishment  of  the  Mogul  Empire.  What  Mahmoud 
had  begun  he  and  his  successors  carried  out  with  more 
continuousness.  Their  empire  was  similar  to  the 
Mussulman  Empires  which  had  preceded  it,  but 
firmer  and  more  consolidated. 

The  seventh  and  eighth  are  desolating  incursions 
like  that  of  Tamerlane.  The  one  was  undertaken  by 
Nadir  Shah,  the  tyrant  who  seized  the  throne  of 
Persia  on  the  fall  of  the  Sofi  dynasty  ;  it  took  place 
in  1739,  when  the  Mogul  Empire  was  already  in  full 
decline.  The  other  took  place  in  1760 ;  the  author 
of  it  was  Ahmed  Shah  Abdali,  head  of  an  Empire  of 
Duranis,  whose  headquarters  were  in  Afghanistan. 

Such  are  the  principal  invasions  which  India  has 
suffered.  A  review  of  them  shows  that,  though 
India  has  but  this  one  point  at  which  she  is  vulner- 
able by  land,  yet  at  this  point  she  is  very  vulnerable 
indeed.     For  a  long  time  indeed  it  seems  that  the 


VII  INTERNAL  AND  EXTERNAL  DANGERS  327 

way  to  invade  her  was  not  discovered,  but  at  least 
from  the  time  of  Mahmond  of  Ghazni  she  has  become 
peculiarly  liable  to  invasion,  and  her  historj'^  has 
been  completely  determined  by  it.  For  she  has 
shown  extremely  little  power  of  resistance.  The 
history  of  India  up  to  and  outside  of  the  English 
conquest  may  be  thus  briefly  summed  up.  It  consists 
in  the  first  place  of  two  great  Mussulman  conquests 
and  of  a  great  Hindu  reaction  against  the  Mussulman 
power,  which  took  shape  in  the  Mahratta  confederacy  ; 
the  two  conquests  were  both  made  from  Afghanistan ; 
in  the  second  place,  of  the  destruction  of  the  two 
great  Mohammedan  Powers  in  succession  and  the 
decisive  humiliation  of  the  Mahratta  Power;  this 
was  accomplished  by  three  other  invasions  from 
Afghanistan.  That  you  may  understand  how  this  is 
so  I  will  ask  you  first  to  examine  the  fall  of  the 
Mogul  Empire — that  is,  the  second  of  the  great 
Mussulman  'Powers.  The  ultimate  cause  of  its  fall 
was  perhaps  the  unwise  attempt  of  Aurungzebe  to 
extend  it  over  the  Deccan  ;  accordingly  its  decline 
began  visibly  at  Aurungzebe's  death.  But  the 
decisive  blow  which  was  mortal  to  it,  which  converted 
it  from  a  sick  man  to  a  dying  man,  was  the  devastat- 
ing invasion  of  Nadir  Shah,  who  came  down  through 
Afghanistan  in  1739.  He  sacked  Delhi,  and  so 
completely  plundered  the  treasury  that  the  Mogul 
Government  was  never  able  to  raise  its  head  again. 
In  precisely  the  same  way  the  Mahratta  Power,  just 
at  the  moment  when  it  seemed  on  the  point  of 
uniting   all   India,    was   broken   by   the   descent   of 


328  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

Ahmed  Shah  Abdali  from  Afghanistan  and  by  the 
fatal  battle  of  Paniput  (in  which  200,000  men  are 
said  to  have  fallen)  in  the  year  1761 — that  is,  when 
the  English  were  already  making  themselves  masters 
of  Bengal.  And  it  appears  to  me  that,  as  these  two 
invasions  were  fatal  to  the  Moguls  and  the  Mahrattas, 
so  the  earlier  invasion  of  Tamerlane  at  the  end  of  the 
fourteenth  century  crushed  the  earlier  Mussulman 
Power,  which  just  before  under  Mohammed  Toghlak 
had  reached  its  greatest  extension. 

But  now,  as  Mahmoud  of  Ghazni  threw  open 
India  to  invasion  from  the  north,  Vasco  da  Gama 
opened  it  to  maritime  invasion  from  Europe.  This 
was,  though  it  did  not  seem  so  at  the  time,  the 
greater  achievement  of  the  two.  For  Mahmoud  only 
established  a  connection  between  India  and  the 
Mussulman  world  of  Western  and  Central  Asia,  but 
Vasco  da  Gama  for  the  first  time  since  Alexander  the 
Great  connected  it  with  Europe,  and  this  time  it  was 
Europe  christianised  and  civilised.  This  could  not 
be  remarked  at  the  time  because,  while  Mahmoud 
came  as  a  mighty  conqueror,  Vasco  da  Gama  was  but  a 
humble  navigator.  His  discovery  for  a  very  long  time 
led  to  no  political  results.  There  followed  a  century 
which  I  called  the  Spanish-Portuguese  age  of  colonial 
history.  Almost  throughout  the  sixteenth  century 
the  whole  newly-discovered  oceanic  world  was  in  the 
hands  of  two  nations,  and  the  Asiatic  half  of  it 
almost  exclusively  in  the  hands  of  the  Portuguese. 
But  in  the  last  years  of  that  century  the  Dutch 
succeeded  in  taking  their  place.     As  to  the  English, 


vn  INTERNAL  AND  EXTERNAL  DANGERS  329 

when  the  seventeenth  century  opened,  they  were  still 
but  timid  interlopers  encroaching  a  little  in  India 
upon  the  monopoly  of  the  Dutch. 

I  explained  above  how  at  the  end  of  the  seven- 
teenth century  England  and  France  had  begun  to 
take  in  the  colonial  world  the  position  which  had 
belonged  in  the  sixteenth  century  to  Spain  and 
Portugal,  and  how  the  whole  eighteenth  century  is 
filled  with  the  struggle  of  these  two  nations  for 
supremacy  in  it.  In  1748  this  struggle  breaks  out 
violently  in  India,  and  it  has  already  become  clear  to 
Dupleix  that  the  struggle  is  political,  not  merely 
commercial,  and  that  the  prize  is  nothing  less  than  an 
Indian  Empire.  Here  then  is  a  momentous  turning 
point  in  the  history  of  Indian  foreign  relations. 
Hitherto  she  had  been  connected  with  the  outer 
world  only  through  Afghanistan ;  henceforth  she  is 
to  be  connected  with  it  also  by  the  sea. 

This  new  connection,  once  established,  for  a  time 
eclipses  the  old,  especially  in  the  eyes  of  the  English 
conquerors  themselves.  As  I  have  said  before,  the 
enemy  whom  the  English  for  a  long  time  continued 
to  dread  most  in  India  was  their  earliest  enemy, 
France.  Invasions  from  Afghanistan  had  not  indeed 
ceased.  Nadir  Shah's  invasion  took  place  only  nine 
years  before  that  year  1748,  from  which  we  date  the 
rise  of  the  British  Empire.  The  invasion  of  Ahmed 
Shah  Abdali  took  place  thirteen  years  later.  But 
these  occurrences  did  not  much  attract  the  attention 
of  the  English.  For  we  are  to  bear  in  mind  that, 
though  they  had  begun  to  conquer,  they  did  not  yet 


330  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

dream  how  far  their  conquests  would  carry  them. 
Because  they  Avere  now  firmly  planted  as  territorial 
rulers  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Fort  St.  George  and 
Fort  William,  they  did  not  as  a  matter  of  course 
think  themselves  responsible  for  all  India,  or  study 
comprehensively  the  relations  of  the  country  con- 
sidered as  a  whole  to  the  outer  world.  The  affairs  of 
Afghanistan  or  the  Punjab  seemed  almost  as  much 
beyond  their  horizon  as  those  of  the  Turkish  Empire. 
But  towards  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century  a 
change  took  place  in  the  view  of  the  English. 
Hitherto  they  had  looked  most  anxiously  towards 
Madras  and  the  Deccan.  Their  main  fear  was  lest 
the  French  might  make  some  new  alliance  with  one 
of  the  native  princes  of  the  South,  might  help  him 
with  arms  and  officers  or  with  a  fleet,  while  he 
descended  upon  Madras.  This  was  what  actually 
took  place  in  that  war  with  France  which  grew  out 
of  the  American  Eevolution,  and  never  perhaps  were 
we  so  hard  pressed  in  India.  Hyder  Ali  descended 
upon  the  Carnatic  to  the  gates  of  Madras,  and  from 
the  sea  the  greatest  of  all  French  sailors,  the  Bailli 
de  Suffren,  co-operated  with  him.  But  fifteen  years 
later  the  whole  face  of  our  foreign  relations  in 
India  was  changed  by  Bonaparte's  Egyptian  expedi- 
tion. French  policy  here  took  a  new  direction.  It 
did  not  indeed  break  off  from  its  old  connections  in 
the  Deccan.  Tippoo  was  expected  to  be  as  useful  to 
the  Directory  as  his  father  Hyder  had  been  to  Louis 
XVI.  But  at  the  same  time  Bonaparte's  occupation 
of   Egypt  and   his   campaign   in   Syria,    movements 


vu  INTERNAL  AND  EXTERNAL  DANGERS  331 

whicli  were  avowedly  aimed  at  England,  seemed  to 
show  that  he  had  conceived  the  design  of  attacking 
our  power  in  India  from  the  north.  Then  for  the 
first  time  we  remembered  Nadir  Shah  and  Ahmed 
Shah  Abdali ;  then  for  the  first  time  we  began  to 
look  anxiously,  as  we  have  so  often  looked  since, 
towards  the  Khyber  Pass,  towards  Zemaun  Shah,  who 
at  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century  sat  in  the  seat 
of  Ahmed  Shah  at  Cabul,  and  towards  the  Court  of 
Persia. 

This  then  is  the  second  great  phase  of  the  foreign 
policy  of  our  Indian  Empire.  It  is  marked  by  the 
celebrated  mission  of  Malcolm  (afterward  Sir  John) 
to  the  Persian  Court  in  1800.  Never  before  had  we 
had  occasion  to  study  what  I  may  call  the  balance  of 
Asia,  or  to  inquire  quid  Tiridaien  terreat,  what  thoughts 
agitate  the  mind  of  the  Persian  king.  But  observe  it 
is  not  the  secret  influence  of  Russia  that  is  feared, 
but  that  of  France.  I  said  before  that  perhaps  the 
Duke  of  Wellington  considered  himself  to  be  fight- 
ing the  French  at  Assaye,  not  less  than  at  Waterloo. 
In  like  manner  you  will  find  that  Malcolm  in  his 
Persian  negotiations  has  Napoleon  and  the  power  of 
France,  not  at  all  that  of  Russia,  in  his  mind. 

But  in  this  second  phase,  though  we  have  begun 
to  look  towards  Afghanistan,  we  have  not  ceased  to 
be  afraid,  as  in  the  first  phase,  of  French  influence  in 
the  South.  The  life  of  this  same  Sir  John  Malcolm 
illustrates  this.  He  was  selected  for  the  Persian 
mission  on  account  of  the  distinction  he  had  won  just 
before  in  the  war  against  Tippoo  Sultan  of  Mysore. 


332  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

Now  this  is  a  war  against  the  French  almost  as  truly 
as  that  earlier  war  in  which  Clive  first  distinguished 
himself.  Tippoo  himself  was  understood  to  be  hand- 
and-glove  with  the  Directory :  Bonaparte  is  his  ally, 
as  Suffren  had  been  his  father's.  The  French  called 
him  Citoyen  Tipou.  And  what  is  the  Nizam  doing  1 
It  was  with  the  Government  of  the  Nizam  at  Hydera- 
bad that  the  French  had  had  their  earliest  connection 
half  a  century  before.  They  knew  even  better  than 
the  English  how  to  conquer  India,  and  that  the  secret 
lay  in  training  sepoys  and  putting  them  under 
European  leadership.  We  find  that  now  in  1798 
there  is  in  the  Hyderabad  country  a  force  of  14,000 
men,  who  are  disciplined  and  commanded  by  French 
officers.  A  certain  Raymond  is  in  command  of  them, 
and  we  read  in  Kaye's  Life  of  Malcolm  that  "  assign- 
ments of  territory  had  been  made  by  the  Nizam  for 
the  pay  of  these  troops.  Foundries  were  established 
under  competent  European  superintendence.  Guns 
were  cast.  Muskets  were  manufactured.  Admirably 
equipped  and  disciplined,  Raymond's  levies  went  out 
to  battle  with  the  colours  of  Revolutionary  France 
floating  above  them  and  the  cap  of  liberty  engraved 
on  their  buttons."  Now  so  long  as  our  nominal 
ally  the  Nizam  supported  such  a  force  and  Tippoo 
was  avowedly  in  concert  with  France,  our  position  in 
the  Deccan  was  not  so  materially  changed  from  what 
it  had  been  when  our  Indian  quarrel  with  France 
first  began.  It  was  still  possible  that  the  tables 
might  be  turned  on  the  English  in  1798  by  Ray- 
mond's force,  as  they  had  been  turned  on  the  French 


vn  INTERNAL  AND  EXTERNAL  DANGERS  333 

before  by  Clive  at  Arcot.  At  this  juncture  the 
young  Malcolm  was  sent  to  Hyderabad,  and  he 
succeeded  in  disbanding  this  French  force,  or,  as  he 
himself  calls  it,  "expelling  this  nest  of  democrats." 

Thus  we  have  two  phases  of  the  foreign  policy  of 
British  India.  At  first  it  has  but  one  enemy  outside 
India,  namely  France,  and  it  expects  the  attack  of 
this  enemy  only  in  one  quarter,  namely  the  Deccan. 
In  the  second  phase  it  has  still  the  same  enemy,  who 
works  in  the  same  way,  but  his  power  has  become 
far  wider.  He  has  formed,  or  is  supposed  to  have 
formed,  relations  with  other  Asiatic  Powers  outside 
India.  These  Powers  are  the  Afghans  and  the 
Persians,  and  after  the  Treaty  of  Tilsit  in  1807  there 
is  added  to  these  another  Power,  European  indeed 
but  beginning  already  to  overhang  Asia,  a  Power 
which  is  now  named  for  the  first  time  in  the  history 
of  British  India,  Russia. 

This  second  phase  is  brought  to  an  end  by  the  fall 
of  Napoleon.  With  him  fell  completely,  though  it 
woidd  be  rash  to  say  finally,  the  influence  of  France 
upon  India.  Her  exclusion  was  secured  by  the 
capture  of  the  Maiu-itius  in  1810  and  by  the  reten- 
tion of  the  island  at  the  general  peace. 

There  followed  a  pause  in  our  foreign  afi'airs. 
Our  Empire  had  no  important  foreign  relations  for 
about  twenty  years.  And  then  began  a  new  phase. 
Another  European  Power  takes  the  place  of  France 
as  our  rival  in  Asia.     This  Power  is  Russia. 

In  the  whole  history  of  Greater  Britain  from  its 
commencement  at  the  end  of  Elizabeth's  reign  we 


334  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect, 

may  perhaps  distinguish  three  gi-eat  periods.  There 
is  first  the  seventeenth  century,  in  which  it  rises 
gradually  from  a  humble  position  to  pre-eminence 
among  colonial  Empires.  There  is  next  that  duel 
with  France  both  in  America  and  Asia,  of  which  I 
have  said  so  much.  This  occupies  the  eighteenth 
century.  But  this  too  passed,  and  we  have  entered 
upon  a  third  phase,  which,  according  to  the  fashion 
of  historical  development,  began  to  form  itself  long 
before  the  second  phase  was  over.  In  this  third 
phase  the  English  world -empire  has  two  gigantic 
neighbours  in  the  West  and  in  the  East.  In  the 
West  she  has  the  United  States  and  in  the  East 
Russia  for  a  neighbour. 

These  are  the  two  States  which  I  have  cited  as 
examples  of  the  modern  tendency  towards  enormbus 
political  aggregations,  such  as  would  have  been 
impossible  but  for  the  modern  inventions  which 
diminish  the  difficulties  caused  by  time  and  space. 
Both  are  continuous  land-powers.  Between  them, 
equally  vast  but  not  continuous,  with  the  ocean  flow- 
ing through  it  in  every  direction,  lies,  like  a  world- 
Venice,  with  the  sea  for  streets,  Greater  Britain. 

This  third  phase  may  in  a  sense  be  said  to  have 
begun  with  the  American  Revolution,  but  it  is  more 
just  to  consider  it  as  dating  only  from  about  the 
thirties  of  the  present  century.  For  the  great  destiny 
that  was  reserved  for  the  United  States  did  not 
become  manifest  till  long  after  its  independence  was 
established.  That  great  emigration  from  Europe 
which    is   the   cause  of  its  rapid  progress,  did  not 


VII  INTERNAL  AND  EXTERNAL  DANGERS  335 

begin  till  after  the  peace  of  1815,  and  in  the  twenties 
again  its  importance  in  the  world  was  vastly  increased 
by  the  South  American  Revolution  and  the  establish- 
ment of  republican  government  in  Spanish  America, 
an  event  which  placed  the  United  States  in  a  lofty 
position  of  primacy  on  the  American  Continent. 
Now  it  was  about  the  same  time  that  the  great 
extension  of  Russia  in  the  East  took  place.  The 
moment  when  we  began  to  feel  keenly  the  rivalry  of 
Russia  in  the  East  is  very  plainly  marked  on  the 
history  of  British  India.  It  was  in  1830  that  Russia 
in  her  progress  touched  the  Jaxartes,  and  soon  after 
she  reduced  Persia  to  a  condition  which  we  might 
take  to  be  one  of  practical  dependence.  When  there- 
fore in  1834,  and  again  in  1837,  Mohammed  Shah  of 
Persia  led  an  army  into  Afghanistan,  we  believed  we 
saw  the  hand  of  Russia,  as  thirty  years  before  we 
had  seen  the  hand  of  Napoleon  when  any  movement 
took  place  in  the  same  region.  At  this  moment 
begins  a  new  and  stormy  period  in  our  Indian  history, 
which  may  be  said  to  extend  to  the  mutiny — that  is, 
over  twenty  years.  This  period  witnessed  a  series  of 
wars,  in  the  course  of  which  we  conquered  the  whole 
north-west,  annexed  the  Punjab,  Sind  and  Oude,  and 
at  last  aroused  a  disquiet  in  the  minds  of  our  Hindu 
subjects  which  issued  in  the  mutiny.  These  disturb- 
ances seem  traceable  in  the  main  to  the  alarm  caused 
by  Russia.  For  it  was  this  alarm  which  led  to  the 
disastrous  expedition  into  Afghanistan,  and  it  was 
in  the  effort  to  restore  our  damaged  reputation  that 
the  conquest  of  Sind  was  made,  and  it  seems  likely 


336  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

also  that  if  these  disturbances  in  the  north-west  had 
not  thus  been  commenced,  the  Sikh  wars  might  never 
have  happened. 

"Lord  Auckland,  we  are  now  very  sure,  did  not 
take  the  right  way  in  1838  to  meet  the  danger  he 
foresaw.  Perhaps  he  exaggerated  the  danger ;  per- 
haps even  now,  after  forty  years  more  have  passed 
and  the  advance  of  Eussia  in  Central  Asia  during 
that  time  has  been  beyond  all  anticipation,  we  still 
exaggerate  the  danger.  But  the  historical  sketch  of 
the  foreign  relations  of  India  which  I  have  given  in 
this  lecture  shows  that  there  exists  a  pima  facie  case 
for  alarm,  which  cannot  but  produce  a  prodigious 
effect.  That  case  rests  upon  the  simple  fact  that 
our  three  predecessors  in  the  Empire  of  India,  the 
Mahrattas  in  1761,  the  Moguls  in  1738,  the  older 
Mussulman  Empire  in  1398,  all  alike  received  a 
mortal  blow  from  a  Power  which  suddenly  invaded 
India  through  Afghanistan,  and  that,  on  two  other 
occasions  quite  distinct  from  these,  invaders  from 
Afghanistan,  viz.  Mahmoud  of  Ghazni  and  Baber, 
have  founded  Empires  in  India. 

I  call  this  a  prima  facie  case  for  alarm.  It  is 
nothing  more.  Such  reasonings  per  enumerationem 
simplicem  can  establish  only  that  there  is  ground  for 
instituting  an  examination,  though  unfortunately 
when  history  is  brought  to  bear  at  all  upon  politics, 
which  happens  but  rarely,  it  is  commonly  done  in 
this  random  way.  We  cannot  argue  from  the  Moguls 
and  Nadir  Shah  to  the  English  and  Russia.  It  would 
be  easy  perhaps  to  show  that  the  Mogul  Empire  never 


ni  INTERNAL  AND  EXTERNAL  DANGERS  337 

had  a  solidity  at  all  approaching  that  of  the  English 
Empire,  and  we  might  point  out  also  that  when 
Nadir  Shah  came  to  Delhi  the  Empire  had  already- 
been  in  manifest  decay  for  thirty  years.  With  re- 
spect to  Russia,  on  the  other  hand,  it  would  be  easy 
to  show  that  it  is  a  Power  wholly  different  in  kind 
from  those  Powers,  generally  more  or  less  Tartar, 
which  have  invaded  India, — a  Power  certainly  far 
greater  and  more  solid  than  most  of  them,  but  still 
so  different  that  we  cannot  assume  it  to  be  equally 
capable  of  invasion  and  conquest  at  a  prodigious 
distance.  In  short,  history  proves  nothing  more  than 
that  the  way  to  India  lies  through  Afghanistan. 
Whether  a  Power  such  as  Russia  can  successfully 
attack  by  this  route  a  Power  such  as  British  India, 
is  a  question  upon  which  historical  precedents  throw 
no  light  whatever.  It  can  be  answered  only  by 
analysing  and  estimating  the  military  resources,  both 
moral  and  material,  of  the  two  Powers. 

But  it  may  be  asked,  How  is  it  possible  to  question 
Russia's  power  or  her  will  to  make  distant  conquests  ? 
Has  she  not  conquered  in  the  North  the  whole  breadth 
of  Asia,  and  in  the  centre  has  she  not  penetrated 
to  Samarcand  and  Khokand?  What  Power  ever 
equalled  her  in  successful  aggression  1  But  we  must 
pronounce  no  man  happy,  Solon  said,  till  we  have 
seen  his  end.  Can  such  a  career  continue  indefinitely, 
when  Russia  shall  have  been  thoroughly  Europeanised 
at  home?  As  soon  as  her  political  awakening  is 
complete,  must  not  a  transformation  of  her  foreign 
policy  take  place  1 

z 


338  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

On  the  other  hand  it  may  be  said,  Who  can  ques- 
tion the  ability  of  England  to  contend  with  Russia  1 
But  as  I  have  argued,  England  is  very  distinct  from 
British  India.  Russia  may  be  rich  enough  to  conquer 
vast  regions  at  a  distance  of  thousands  of  miles,  but 
England  is  not.  British  India  must  in  the  main 
defend  herself — that  is,  she  can  have  English  troops, 
but  she  must  pay  for  them. 

We  must  ask  then.  What  is  the  inherent  strength 
of  British  India?  And  thus  its  stability  depends 
upon  its  being  strong  enough  to  withstand  those  in- 
ternal dangers  I  spoke  of,  complicated  with  the  ex- 
ternal danger  from  Afghanistan.  We  were  able  to 
put  down  the  mutiny,  and  perhaps  we  could  defeat 
a  Russian  army  of  invasion.  But  what  if  a  mutiny 
and  a  Russian  invasion  came  together  1  What  if  our 
native  army,  in  some  fit  of  disaffection  or  in  some 
vague  hope  of  profiting  by  a  change,  should  prefer 
the  Russian  service  to  the  English?  This  is  the 
danger  which  since  about  1830  has  been  foreseen. 
The  Government  can  hold  its  own  within  and  also 
without.  But  it  has  little  strength  to  spare,  and 
must  guard  itself  anxiously  against  any  coalition 
between  its  domestic  and  its  foreign  enemies. 

Other  combinations  may  be  imagined  which  would 
be  extremely  dangerous.  Thus  it  is  sometimes 
argued  that  sooner  or  later  avo  must  lose  India, 
because  sooner  or  later  some  war  in  Europe  will  force 
us  to  withdraw  our  English  troops.  It  is  true  that 
without  those  troops  we  cannot  keep  India,  and  yet 
some  great  sudden  attack  upon  ourselves,  such  as  an 


VII  INTERNAL  AND  EXTEKNAL  DANGERS  339 

invasion  of  England,  might  compel  us  to  send  for 
them.  It  is  however  also  true  that  such  a  danger  is 
not  at  present  to  be  foreseen,  for  what  enemy  could 
invade  us  but  France  1  Now  sixty-eight  years  have 
passed  since  we  last  fought  the  French;  our  old 
hostility  to  France  has  become  a  matter  of  ancient 
history ;  and  the  aggressive  power  of  France  has 
much  declined. 

But  the  subject  is  too  large  for  the  space  I  am  able 
to  give  to  it,  and  I  must  ask  you  to  be  content  with 
this  imperfect  outline. 


LECTURE   VIII 


RECAPITULATION 


We  have  now  dwelt  for  a  long  time  on  that  extra- 
ordinary expansion  which  has  had  the  effect  that, 
considered  as  a  state,  England  has  left  Europe 
altogether  behind  it  and  become  a  world-state,  while, 
considered  purely  as  a  nation — that  is,  as  speaking  a 
certain  language — she  has  furnished  out  two  world- 
states,  which  vie  with  each  other  in  vigour,  influence, 
and  rapidity  of  growth.  We  have  inquired  into  the 
causes,  traced  the  process,  and  considered  some  of 
the  results  of  this  expansion.  It  remains  then  in 
this  closing  lecture  to  gather  up  the  impressions  we 
have  received  into  a  general  conclusion. 

There  are  two  schools  of  opinion  among  us  with 
respect  to  our  Empire,  of  which  schools  the  one  may 
be  called  the  bombastic  and  the  other  the  pessimistic. 
The  one  is  lost  in  wonder  and  ecstasy  at  its  immense 
dimensions,  and  at  the  energy  and  heroism  which 
presumably  have  gone  to  the  making  of  it;  this 
school  therefore  advocates  the  maintenance  of  it  as  a 


LECT,  vill  KECAPITULATION  341 

point  of  honour  or  sentiment.  The  other  is  in  the 
opposite  extreme,  regards  it  as  founded  in  aggression 
and  rapacity,  as  useless  and  burdensome,  a  kind  of 
excrescence  upon  England,  as  depriving  us  of  the 
advantages  of  our  insularity  and  exposing  us  to  wars 
and  quarrels  in  every  part  of  the  globe ;  this  school 
therefore  advocates  a  policy  which  may  lead  at  the 
earliest  possible  opportunity  to  the  abandonment  of 
it.  Let  us  consider  then  how  our  studies,  now  that 
they  are  concluded,  have  led  us  to  regard  these  two 
opposite  opinions. 

We  have  been  led  to  take  a  much  more  sober  view 
of  the  Empire  than  would  satisfy  the  bombastic 
school.  At  the  outset  we  are  not  much  impressed 
with  its  vast  extent,  because  we  know  no  reason  in 
the  nature  of  things  why  a  state  should  be  any  the 
better  for  being  large,  and  because  throughout  the 
greater  part  of  history  very  large  states  have  usually 
been  states  of  a  low  type.  Nor  again  can  we  imagine 
why  it  should  be  our  duty  to  maintain  our  Empire 
for  an  indefinite  time  simply  out  of  respect  for  the 
heroism  of  those  who  won  it  for  us,  or  because  the 
abandonment  of  it  might  seem  to  betray  a  want  of 
spirit.  All  political  unions  exist  for  the  good  of  their 
members,  and  should  be  just  as  large,  and  no  larger, 
as  they  can  be  without  ceasing  to  be  beneficial.  It 
would  seem  to  us  insane  that  if  the  connection  with 
the  colonies  or  with  India  hampered  both  parties,  if 
it  did  harm  rather  than  good,  England  should  resolve 
to  maintain  it  to  her  own  detriment  and  to  that  of 
her  dependencies.     We  find  too  a  confusion  of  ideas 


342  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lbct. 

hidden  under  much  of  the  bombastic  language  of  this 
school,  for  they  seem  to  conceive  of  the  dependencies 
of  England  as  of  so  much  property  belonging  to  her, 
as  if  the  Queen  were  like  some  Sesostris  or  Solomon 
of  the  ancient  world,  to  whom  "Tarshish  and  the 
isles  brought  presents,  Arabia  and  Sheba  offered 
gifts  " ;  whereas  the  connection  is  really  not  of  this 
kind  at  all,  and  England  is  not,  directly  at  least,  any 
the  richer  for  it  And  further  we  have  ventured  to 
doubt  that  the  vastness  of  this  Empire  necessarily 
proves  some  invincible  heroism  or  supernatural  genius 
for  government  in  our  nation.  Undoubtedly  some 
facts  may  be  adduced  to  show  natural  aptitude  for 
colonisation  and  a  faculty  of  leadership  in  our  race. 
A  good  number  of  Englishmen  may  be  cited  who 
have  exerted  an  almost  magical  ascendency  over  the 
minds  of  the  native  races  of  India ;  and  in  Canada 
again,  where  the  English  settlers  have  competed 
directly  with  the  French,  they  have  shown  a  marked 
superiority  in  enterprise  and  energy.  But  though 
there  is  much  to  admire  in  the  history  of  Greater 
Britain,  yet  the  pre-eminence  of  England  in  the  New 
World  has  certainly  not  been  won  by  sheer  natural 
superiority.  In  the  heroic  age  of  maritime  discovery 
we  did  not  greatly  shine.  We  did  not  show  the 
genius  of  the  Portuguese,  and  we  did  not  produce  a 
Columbus  or  a  Magelhaen.  When  I  examined  the 
causes  which  enabled  us  after  two  centuries  to  surpass 
other  nations  in  colonisation,  I  found  that  we  had  a 
broader  basis  and  a  securer  position  at  home  than 
Portugal  and  Holland,  and  that  we  were  less  involved 


vm  RECAPITULATION  343 

in  great  European  enterprises  than  France  and  Spain. 
In  like  manner  Avhen  I  inquired  how  we  could  con- 
quer, and  that  with  little  trouble,  the  vast  country  of 
India,  I  found  that  after  all  we  did  it  by  means 
mainly  of  Indian  troops,  to  whom  we  imparted  a 
skill  which  was  not  so  much  English  as  European, 
that  the  French  showed  us  the  way,  and  that  the 
condition  of  the  country  was  such  as  to  render  it 
peculiarly  open  to  conquest. 

Thus  I  admitted  very  much  of  what  is  urged 
by  the  pessimists  against  the  bombastic  school.  I 
endeavoured  to  judge  the  Empire  by  its  own  intrinsic 
merits,  and  to  see  it  as  it  is,  not  concealing  the  incon- 
veniences which  may  attend  such  a  vast  expansion,  or 
the  dangers  to  which  it  may  expose  us,  nor  finding 
any  compensation  for  these  in  the  notion  that  there 
is  something  intrinsically  glorious  in  an  Empire  "  upon 
which  the  sun  never  sets,"  or,  to  use  another  equally 
brilliant  expression,  an  Empire  "  whose  morning 
drum-beat,  following  the  sun  and  keeping  company 
with  the  hours,  encircles  the  globe  with  an  unbroken 
chain  of  martial  airs."  But  though  there  is  little  that 
is  glorious  in  most  of  the  great  Empires  mentioned 
in  history,  since  they  have  usually  been  created  by 
force  and  have  remained  at  a  low  level  of  political 
life,  we  observed  that  Greater  Britain  is  not  in  the 
ordinary  sense  an  Empire  at  all.  Looking  at  the 
colonial  part  of  it  alone,  we  see  a  natural  growth,  a 
mere  normal  extension  of  the  English  race  into  other 
lands,  which  for  the  most  part  were  so  thinly  peopled 
that  our  settlers   took  possession   of  them  without 


344  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

conquest.  If  there  is  nothing  highly  glorious  in  such 
an  expansion,  there  is  at  the  same  time  nothing  forced 
or  unnatural  about  it.  It  creates  not  properly  an 
Empire,  but  only  a  very  large  state.  So  far  as  the 
expansion  itself  is  concerned,  no  one  does  or  can 
regard  it  but  with  pleasiire.  For  a  nation  to  have  an 
outlet  for  its  superfluous  population  is  one  of  the 
greatest  blessings.  Population  unfortunately  does 
not  adapt  itself  to  space ;  on  the  contrary,  the  larger 
it  is  the  larger  is  its  yearly  increment.  Now  that 
Great  Britain  is  already  full  it  becomes  fuller  with 
increased  speed ;  it  gains  a  million  every  three  years. 
Probably  emigration  ought  to  proceed  at  a  far  greater 
rate  than  it  does,  and  assuredly  the  greatest  evils 
would  arise  if  it  were  checked.  But  should  there  be 
an  expansion  of  the  State  as  well  as  of  the  nation  1 
"  No,"  say  the  pessimists,  "  or  only  till  the  colony  is 
giown-up  and  ready  for  independence."  When  a 
metaphor  comes  to  be  regarded  as  an  argument,  what 
an  irresistible  argument  it  always  seems !  I  have 
suggested  that  in  the  modern  world  distance  has  very 
much  lost  its  effect,  and  that  there  are  signs  of  a  time 
when  states  will  be  vaster  than  they  have  hitherto 
been.  In  ancient  times  emigrants  from  Greece  to 
Sicily  took  up  their  independence  at  once,  and  in 
those  parts  there  were  almost  as  many  states  as  cities. 
In  the  eighteenth  century  Burke  thought  a  federation 
quite  impossible  across  the  Atlantic  Ocean.  In  such 
times  the  metaphor  of  the  grown-up  son  might  well 
harden  into  a  convincing  demonstration.  But  since 
Burke's  time  the  Atlantic  Ocean  has  shrunk  till  it 


viii  RECAPITULATION  345 

seems  scarcely  broader  than  the  sea  between  Greece 
and  Sicily.  Why  then  do  we  not  drop  the  metaphor  1 
I  have  urged  that  we  are  unconsciously  influenced  by 
a  historic  parallel  which  when  examined  turns  out  to 
be  inapplicable.  As  indeed  it  is  true  generally  that 
one  urgent  reason  why  politicians  should  study  history 
is  that  they  may  guard  themselves  against  the  false 
historical  analogies  which  continually  mislead  those 
who  do  not  study  history  !  These  views  are  founded 
on  the  American  Revolution,  and  yet  the  American 
Revolution  arose  out  of  circumstances  and  out  of  a 
condition  of  the  world  which  has  long  since  passed 
away.  England  Avas  then  an  agricultural  country  by 
no  means  thickly  peopled ;  America  was  full  of 
religious  refugees  animated  by  ideas  which  in  England 
had  lately  passed  out  of  fashion  ;  there  was  scarcely 
any  flux  and  reflux  of  population  between  the  two 
countries,  and  the  ocean  divided  them  with  a  gulf 
which  seemed  as  unbridgeable  as  that  moral  gulf 
which  separates  an  Englishman  from  a  Frenchman. 
Even  then  the  separation  was  not  eff"ected  without  a 
great  wrench.  It  is  true  that  both  countries  have 
prospered  since,  nevertheless  they  have  had  a  second 
war  and  may  have  a  third,  and  it  is  wholly  an  illusion 
to  suppose  that  their  prosperity  has  been  caused  or 
promoted  by  their  separation.  At  any  rate  all  the 
conditions  of  the  world  are  altered  now.  The  great 
causes  of  division,  oceans  and  religious  disabilities, 
have  ceased  to  operate.  Vast  uniting  forces  have 
begun  to  work,  trade  and  emigi-ation.  Meanwhile 
the  natural  ties  which  unite  Englishmen  resume  their 


346  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

influence  as  soon  as  the  counteracting  pressure  is 
removed — I  mean  tlie  ties  of  nationality,  language,  and 
religion.  The  mother-country  having  once  for  all 
ceased  to  be  a  stepmother,  and  to  make  unjust 
claims  and  impose  annoying  restrictions,  and  since 
she  wants  her  colonies  as  an  outlet  both  for  popula- 
tion and  trade,  and  since  on  the  other  hand  the 
colonies  must  feel  that  there  is  risk,  not  to  say  also 
intellectual  impoverishment,  in  independence, — since 
finally  intercourse  is  ever  increasing  and  no  alienating 
force  is  at  work  to  counteract  it,  but  the  discords 
created  by  the  old  system  pass  more  and  more  into 
oblivion, — it  seems  possible  that  our  colonial  Empire 
so-called  may  more  and  more  deserve  to  be  called 
Greater  Britain,  and  that  the  tie  may  become  stronger 
and  stronger.  Then  the  seas  which  divide  us  might 
be  forgotten,  and  that  ancient  preconception,  which 
leads  us  always  to  think  of  ourselves  as  belonging  to 
a  single  island,  might  be  rooted  out  of  our  minds.  If 
in  this  way  we  moved  sensibly  nearer  in  our  thoughts 
and  feelings  to  the  colonies,  and  accustomed  ourselves 
to  think  of  emigrants  as  not  in  any  way  lost  to 
England  by  settling  in  the  colonies,  the  result  might 
be,  first  that  emigration  on  a  vast  scale  might  become 
our  remedy  for  pauperism,  and  secondly  that  some 
organisation  might  gradually  be  arrived  at  which 
might  make  the  whole  force  of  the  Empire  available 
in  time  of  war. 

In  taking  this  view  I  have  borne  in  mind  the 
example  of  the  United  States.  It  is  curious  that  the 
pessimists   among   ourselves   should   generally   have 


VIII  RECAPITULATION  347 

been  admirers  of  the  United  States,  and  yet  there  we 
have  the  most  striking  example  of  confident  and 
successful  expansion.  Those  colonies  which,  when 
they  parted  from  us,  did  but  fringe  the  Atlantic 
sea-board,  and  had  but  lately  begun  to  push  their 
settlements  into  the  valley  of  the  Ohio,  how  steadily, 
how  boundlessly,  and  with  what  steadfast  seK-reliance 
have  they  advanced  since  !  They  have  covered  with 
their  States  or  Territories,  first  the  mighty  Mississippi 
valley,  next  the  Rocky  Mountains,  and  lastly  the 
Pacific  coast.  They  have  made  no  difiiculty  of 
absorbing  all  this  territory ;  it  has  not  shaken  their 
political  system.  And  yet  they  have  never  said,  as 
among  us  even  those  who  are  not  pessimists  say  of 
the  colonies,  that  if  they  wish  to  secede,  of  course 
they  can  do  so.  On  the  contrary  they  have  firmly 
denied  this  right,  and  to  maintain  the  unity  of  their 
vast  state  have  sacrificed  blood  and  treasure  in  un- 
exampled profusion.  They  fii-mly  refused  to  allow 
their  Union  to  be  broken  up,  or  to  listen  to  the 
argument  that  a  state  is  none  the  better  for  being 
very  large. 

Perhaps  we  are  hardly  alive  to  the  vast  results 
which  are  flowing  in  politics  from  modern  mechanism. 
Throughout  the  greater  part  of  human  history  the 
process  of  state-building  has  been  governed  by  strict 
conditions  of  space.  For  a  long  time  no  high  organ- 
isation was  possible  except  in  very  small  states.  In 
antiquity  the  good  states  were  usually  cities,  and 
Rome  herself  when  she  became  an  Empire  was  obliged 
to  adopt  a  lower  organisation.      In  medieval  Europe, 


348  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

states  sprang  up  which  were  on  a  larger  scale  than 
those  of  antiquity,  but  for  a  long  time  these  too  were 
lower  organisms  and  looked  up  to  Athens  and  Rome 
with  reverence  as  to  the  homes  of  political  greatness. 
But  through  the  invention  of  the  representative 
system  these  states  have  risen  to  a  higher  level.  We 
now  see  states  with  vivid  political  consciousness  on 
territories  of  two  hundred  thousand  square  miles  and 
in  populations  of  thirty  millions.  A  further  advance 
is  now  being  made.  The  federal  system  has  been 
added  to  the  representative  system,  and  at  the  same 
time  steam  and  electricity  have  been  introduced. 
From  these  improvements  has  resulted  the  possibility 
of  highly  organised  states  on  a  yet  larger  scale.  Thus 
Eussia  in  Europe  has  already  a  population  of  near 
eighty  millions  on  a  territory  of  more  than  two 
millions  of  square  miles,  and  the  United  States 
will  have  by  the  end  of  the  century  a  population  as 
large  upon  a  territory  of  four  millions  of  square  miles. 
We  cannot,  it  is  true,  yet  speak  of  Russia  as  having  a 
high  type  of  organisation  ;  she  has  her  trials  and  her 
transformation  to  come;  but  the  Union  has  shown 
herself  able  to  combine  free  institutions  in  the  fullest 
degree  with  boundless  expansion. 

Now  if  it  offends  us  to  hear  our  Empire  described 
in  the  language  of  Oriental  bombast,  we  need  not 
conclude  that  the  Empire  itself  is  in  fault,  for  it  is 
open  to  us  to  think  that  it  has  been  wrongly  classified. 
Instead  of  comparing  it  to  that  which  it  resembles  in 
no  degree,  some  Turkish  or  Persian  congeries  of 
nations  forced  together  by  a  conquering  horde,  let  us 


VIII  RECAPITULATION  349 

compare  it  to  the  United  States,  and  we  shall  see  at 
once  that,  so  far  from  being  of  an  obsolete  type,  it  is 
precisely  the  sort  of  union  which  the  conditions  of 
the  time  most  naturally  call  into  existence. 

Lastly,  let  us  observe  that  the  question,  whether 
large  states  or  small  states  are  best,  is  not  one  which 
can  be  answered  or  ought  to  be  discussed  absolutely. 
We  often  hear  abstract  panegyrics  upon  the  happiness 
of  small  states.  But  observe  that  a  small  state 
among  small  states  is  one  thing,  and  a  small  state 
among  large  states  quite  another.  Nothing  is  more 
delightful  than  to  read  of  the  bright  days  of  Athens 
and  Florence,  but  those  bright  days  lasted  only  so 
long  as  the  states  with  which  Athens  and  Florence 
had  to  do  were  states  on  a  similar  scale  of  magnitude. 
Both  states  sank  at  once  as  soon  as  large  country- 
states  of  consolidated  strength  grew  up  in  their 
neighbourhood.  The  lustre  of  Athens  grew  pale  as 
soon  as  Macedonia  rose,  and  Charles  V.  speedily 
brought  to  an  end  the  great  days  of  Florence.  Now 
if  it  be  true  that  a  larger  type  of  state  than  any 
hitherto  known  is  springing  up  in  the  world,  is  not 
this  a  serious  consideration  for  those  states  which 
rise  only  to  the  old  level  of  magnitude?  Russia 
already  presses  somewhat  heavily  on  Central  Europe  ; 
what  will  she  do  when  with  her  vast  territory  and 
population  she  equals  Germany  in  intelligence  and 
organisation,  when  all  her  railways  are  made,  her 
people  educated,  and  her  government  settled  on  a 
solid  basis  ? — and  let  us  remember  that  if  we  allow 
her  half  a  century  to  make  so  much  progress  her 


350  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  lect. 

population  will  at  the  end  of  that  time  be  not  eighty 
but  nearly  a  hundred  and  sixty  millions.  At  that 
time  which  many  here  present  may  live  to  see, 
Russia  and  the  United  States  will  surpass  in  power 
the  states  now  called  great  as  much  as  the  great 
country-states  of  the  sixteenth  century  surpassed 
Florence.  Is  not  this  a  serious  consideration,  and  is 
it  not  especially  so  for  a  state  like  England,  which 
has  at  the  present  moment  the  choice  in  its  hands 
between  two  courses  of  action,  the  one  of  which 
may  set  it  in  that  future  age  on  a  level  with  the 
greatest  of  these  great  states  of  the  future,  while 
the  other  will  reduce  it  to  the  level  of  a  purely 
European  Power  looking  back,  as  Spain  does  now,  to 
the  .great  days  when  she  pretended  to  be  a  world- 
state. 

But  what  I  have  been  saying  does  not  apply  to 
India.  If  England  and  her  colonies  taken  together 
make,  properly  speaking,  not  an  Empire  but  only  a 
very  large  state,  this  is  because  the  population  is 
English  throughout  and  the  institutions  are  of  the 
same  kind.  In  India  the  population  is  wholly  foreign, 
and  the  institutions  wholly  unlike  our  own.  India 
is  reallj'^  an  Empire  and  an  Oriental  Empire.  It  is  in 
relation  to  India  especially  that  the  language  of  the 
bombastic  school  oflFends  us,  and  that  we  are  struck 
by  the  misconception  which  is  betrayed  in  their 
high-flown  imagery  borrowed  from  the  ancient  world. 
And  here  we  cannot,  on  looking  more  closely  into 
the  phenomenon,  reconcile  ourselves  to  it  by  dis- 
covering that,  though  it  has  not  the  romantic  great- 


VIII  RECAPITULATION  351 

ness  attributed  to  it,  yet  it  has  a  solid  value  and 
utility  to  us  which  is  of  another  kind  altogether. 

Gradually  and  in  recent  times  a  great  trade 
between  India  and  England  has  sprung  up,  but  even 
this,  as  I  pointed  out,  was  hardly  contemplated  by 
those  who  had  the  principal  share  in  founding  the 
Indian  Empire.  And  it  is  diflScult  to  see  what  other 
great  advantages  we  reap  from  it,  so  that  we  ask 
ourselves  in  some  perplexity,  what  made  us  take  the 
trouble  of  acquiring  it.  Historically  the  answer  is, 
that  in  our  great  colonial  struggle  with  France  we 
were  led  into  wars  which  left  us  in  possession  of 
territories  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Calcutta  and 
Madras,  that  we  then  proceeded  to  organise  our 
government  of  them,  that  we  successfully  purged 
away  the  corruption  which  had  sprung  up  in  the  first 
period  of  conquest,  and  created  an  administration 
that  was  pure  and  under  the  direct  control  of  the 
Government  at  home ;  but  that  afterwards  there 
arose  a  line  of  Governors-General  who  on  high 
grounds  of  statesmanship  were  favourable  to  annexa- 
tion. The  policy  now  adopted  was  not  sordid,  but  it 
may  have  been  ambitious  and  unscrupulous.  If  we 
are  to  think,  as  Mr.  Torrens  ^  imagines,  that  Pitt  and 
Lord  Wellesley  in  secret  deliberation  determined  to 
replace  the  American  colonies  by  an  Eastern  Empire, 
such  an  idea,  according  to  the  view  taken  in  these 
lectures,  belongs  to  an  unsound  and  chimerical  system 
of  politics.  But  ostensibly  the  policy  was  fustified 
by  arguments  chiefly  of  a  philanthropic  kind,  and 
1  Tlie  Marquis   Wellesley,  by  W.  M.  Torrens,  M.P.,  vol.  i.  p.  128, 


352  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LEOT. 

they  were  arguments  of  such  strength  that  it  was 
difficult  to  resist  them.  It  was  not  to  be  denied 
that  a  most  deplorable  anarchy  reigned  in  India. 
Here  and  there  a  tyranny  arose  which  had  some 
degree  of  stability,  though  it  was  almost  always  a 
military  government  of  the  lowest  type.  But  over 
the  greater  part  of  India  there  prevailed  a  system 
which  it  would  be  appropriate  to  call,  not  govern- 
ment of  a  low  type,  but  robbery  of  a  high  type. 
Occasionally  in  Europe,  as  in  some  Highland  clans 
or  among  the  Western  buccaneers,  or  those  ancient 
pirates  of  the  Mediterranean  whom  Pompey  was 
commissioned  to  suppress,  robber-bands  have  had 
almost  the  magnitude  and  organisation  of  states,  but 
they  never  have  reached  the  scale  of  the  robber-states 
of  India.  The  Mahrattas  levied  their  chout,  a  sort  of 
blackmail,  all  over  India,  and  at  a  later  time  the 
Pindarrees  surpassed  the  Mahrattas  in  cruelty.  Now 
this  anarchy  arose  directly  out  of  the  decline  of  the 
authority  of  the  Great  Mogul.  It  was  possible  of 
course  for  the  English  to  wash  their  hands  of  all  this, 
to  defend  their  own  territories,  and  let  the  chaos 
welter  as  it  would  outside  their  frontier.  But  to 
Governors-General  on  the  spot  such  a  course  might 
easily  seem  not  just  but  simply  cruel.  Aggrandise- 
ment might  present  itself  in  the  light  of  a  simple 
duty,  when  it  seemed  that  by  extending  our  Empire 
the  reign  of  robbery  and  murder  might  be  brought  to 
an  end  in  a  moment,  and  that  of  law  commence.^ 

1  "  It  is  a  proud  phrase  to  use,  but  it  is  a  true  one,  that  we  liave 
bestowed  blessings  upon  millions  .  .  .  The  ploughman  is  again  in 


VIII  RECAPITULATION  353 

A.ccordingly  Lord  Wellesley  laid  it  do^vn  that  there 
had  always  been  a  paramount  Power  in  India,  that 
such  a  paramount  Power  was  necessary  to  the 
country,  and  that  it  became  the  duty  of  the  Company, 
now  that  the  power  of  the  Mogul  had  come  to  an 
end,  to  save  India  by  assuming  his  function. 

And  thus  we  founded  our  Empire,  partly  it  may 
be  out  of  an  empty  ambition  of  conquest  and  partly 
out  of  a  philanthropic  desire  to  put  an  end  to 
enormous  evils.  But,  whatever  our  motives  might 
be,  we  incurred  vast  responsibilities,  which  were 
compensated  by  no  advantages.  We  have  now 
acquired  a  great  Indian  trade,  but  even  this  we 
purchase  at  the  expense  of  a  perpetual  dread  of 
Russia,  and  of  all  movements  in  the  Mussulman 
world,  and  of  all  changes  in  Egypt.  Thus  a  review 
of  the  history  of  British  India  leaves  on  the  mind  an 
impression  quite  different  from  that  which  our 
Colonial  Empire  produces.  The  latter  has  grown  up 
naturally,  out  of  the  operation  of  the  plainest  causes  ; 
the  former  seems  to  have  sprung  from  a  romantic 
adventure ;  it  is  highly  interesting,  striking,  and 
curious,  but  difficult  to  understand  or  to  form  an 
opinion  about.  We  may  hope  that  it  will  lead  to 
good,  but  hitherto  we  have  not  ourselves  reaped 
directly  much  good  from  it. 

I  have  shown  you  however  that,  though  it  may  be 
called  an  Oriental  Empire,  it  is  much  less  dangerous 

every  quarter  turning  up  a  soil  which  had  for  many  seasons  never 
been  stirred  except  by  the  hoofs  of  predatory  cavalry."  Lord 
Hastings,  February  1819. 

2a 


354  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LECT. 

to  US  than  that  description  might  seem  to  imply.  It 
is  not  an  Empire  attached  to  England  in  the  same 
way  as  the  Roman  Empire  was  attached  to  Rome  ;  it 
will  not  drag  us  down,  or  infect  us  at  home  with 
Oriental  notions  or  methods  of  government.  Nor  is 
it  an  Empire  which  costs  us  money  or  hampers  our 
finances.  It  is  self-supporting,  and  is  held  at  arm's 
length  in  such  a  way  that  our  destiny  is  not  very 
closely  entangled  with  its  own. 

Next  I  have  led  you  to  consider  what  may  be  the 
effect  of  our  Indian  Empire  upon  India  itself.  We 
perhaps  have  not  gained  much  from  it;  but  has 
India  gained  ?  On  this  question  I  have  desired  to 
speak  with  great  diffidence.  I  have  asserted  con- 
fidently only  thus  much,  that  no  greater  experiment 
has  ever  been  tried  on  the  globe,  and  that  the  efi"ects 
of  it  will  be  comparable  to  the  efiect  of  the  Roman 
Empire  upon  the  nations  of  Europe — nay,  probably 
they  will  be  much  greater.  This  means  no  doubt 
that  vast  benefits  will  be  done  to  India,  but  it  does 
not  necessarily  mean  that  great  mischiefs  may  not 
also  be  done.  Nay,  if  you  ask  on  which  side  the 
balance  will  incline,  and  whether,  if  we  succeed  in 
bringing  India  into  the  full  current  of  European 
civilisation,  we  shaU  not  evidently  be  rendering  her 
the  greatest  possible  service,  I  should  only  answer, 
"I  hope  so;  I  trust  so."  In  the  academic  study  of 
these  vast  questions  Ave  should  take  care  to  avoid  the 
optimistic  commonplaces  of  the  newspaper.  Our 
Western  civilisation  is  perhaps  not  absolutely  the 
glorious  thing  we  like  to  imagine   it.     Those  who 


VIII  RECAPITULATION  355 

watch  India  most  impartially  see  that  a  vast  trans- 
formation goes  on  there,  but  sometimes  it  produces 
a  painful  impression  upon  them ;  they  see  much 
destroyed,  bad  things  and  good  things  together ; 
sometimes  they  doubt  whether  they  see  many  good 
things  called  into  existence.  But  they  see  one 
enormous  improvement,  under  which  we  may  fairly 
hope  that  all  other  improvements  are  potentially 
included  ;  they  see  anarchy  and  plunder  brought  to 
an  end  and  something  like  the  immensa  majestas 
Romanae  pacis  established  among  two  hundred  and 
fifty  millions  of  human  beings. 

Another  thing  almost  all  observers  see,  and  that 
is  that  the  experiment  must  go  forward,  and  that  we 
cannot  leave  it  unfinished  if  we  would.  For  here  too 
the  great  uniting  forces  of  the  age  are  at  work ; 
England  and  India  are  drawn  every  year  for  good  or 
for  evil  more  closely  together.  Not  indeed  that  dis- 
uniting forces  might  not  easily  spring  up,  not  that 
our  rule  itself  may  not  possibly  be  calling  out  forces 
which  may  ultimately  tend  to  disruption,  nor  yet  that 
the  Empire  is  altogether  free  from  the  danger  of  a 
sudden  catastrophe.  But  for  the  present  we  are 
driven  both  by  necessity  and  duty  to  a  closer  union. 
Already  we  should  ourselves  suflfer  greatly  from  dis- 
ruption, and  the  longer  the  union  lasts  the  more 
important  it  will  become  to  us.  Meanwhile  the  same 
is  true  in  an  infinitely  greater  degree  of  India  itself 
The  transformation  we  are  making  there  may  cause 
us  some  misgivings,  but  though  wc  may  be  led  con- 
ceivably to  wish  that  it  had  never  been  begun,  nothing 


356  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  LBOT. 

could  ever  convince  us  that  it  ought  to  be  broken  off 
in  the  middle. 

Altogether  I  hope  that  our  long  course  of  medita- 
tion upon  the  expansion  of  England  may  have  led 
you  to  feel  that  there  is  something  fantastic  in  all 
those  notions  of  abandoning  the  colonies  or  abandon- 
ing India,  which  are  so  freely  broached  among  us. 
Have  we  really  so  much  power  over  the  march  of 
events  as  we  suppose  1  Can  we  cancel  the  growth  of 
centuries  for  a  whim,  or  because,  when  we  throw  a 
hasty  glance  at  it,  it  does  not  suit  our  fancies  1  The 
lapse  of  time  and  the  force  of  life,  "  which  working 
strongly  binds,"  limit  our  freedom  more  than  we 
know,  and  even  when  we  are  not  conscious  of  it  at  all. 
It  is  true  that  we  in  England  have  never  accustomed 
our  imaginations  to  the  thought  of  Greater  Britain. 
Our  politicians,  our  historians  still  think  of  England 
not  of  Greater  Britain  as  their  country ;  they  still 
think  only  that  England  has  colonies,  and  they  allow 
themselves  to  talk  as  if  she  could  easily  Avhistle  them 
off,  and  become  again  with  perfect  comfort  to  herself 
the  old  solitary  island  of  Queen  Elizabeth's  time,  "  in 
a  great  pool  a  swan's  nest."  But  the  fancy  is  but  a 
chimera  produced  by  inattention,  one  of  those 
monsters — for  such  monsters  there  are — which  are 
created  not  by  imagination  but  by  the  want  of 
imagination  ! 

But  though  this  is  a  conclusion  to  which  I  am  led, 
it  is  not  the  conclusion  which  I  wish  to  leave  most 
strongly  impressed  on  your  minds.  What  I  desire 
here  is  not  so  much  to  impart  to  you  a  just  view  of 


VIII  RECAPITULATION  357 

practical  politics,  as  a  just  view  of  the  object  and 
method  of  historical  study.  My  chief  aim  in  these 
lectures  has  been  to  show  in  what  light  the  more 
recent  history  of  England  ought  to  be  regarded  by 
the  student.  It  seems  to  me  that  most  of  our 
historians,  when  they  come  to  those  modern  periods, 
lose  the  clue,  betray  embarrassment  in  the  choice  of 
topics,  and  end  by  producing  a  story  without  a  moral. 
I  have  argued  in  the  first  place  that  history  is  con- 
cerned, not  mainly  with  the  interesting  things  which 
may  have  been  done  by  Englishmen  or  in  England, 
but  with  England  herself  considered  as  a  nation  and 
a  state.  To  make  this  more  plain  I  have  narrated 
nothing,  told  no  thrilling  stories,  drawn  no  heroic 
portraits  ;  I  have  kept  always  before  you  England  as 
a  great  whole.  In  her  story  there  is  little  that  is 
dramatic,  for  she  can  scarcely  die,  and  in  this  period 
at  least  has  not  suffered  or  been  in  danger  of  suffer- 
ing much.  What  great  changes  has  she  undergone 
in  this  period?  Considerable  political  changes  no 
doubt,  but  none  that  have  been  so  memorable  as 
those  she  underwent  in  the  seventeenth  century. 
Then  she  made  one  of  the  greatest  political  dis- 
coveries, and  taught  all  the  world  how  liberty  might 
be  adapted  to  the  conditions  of  a  nation-state.  On 
the  other  hand  the  modern  political  movement,  that 
of  Reform  or  Liberalism,  began  not  in  England  but 
on  the  Continent,  from  whence  we  borrowed  it.  The 
peculiarly  English  movement,  I  have  urged,  in  this 
period  has  been  an  unparalleled  expansion.  Grasp 
this  fact,  and  you  have  the  clue  both  to  the  eighteenth 


358  EXPANSION  OF  ENGLAND  leot. 

and  the  nineteenth  centuries.  The  wars  with  France 
from  Louis  XIV.  to  Napoleon  fall  into  an  intelligible 
series.  The  American  Revolution  and  the  conquest 
of  India  cease  to  seem  mere  digressions  and  take 
their  proper  places  in  the  main  line  of  English  history. 
The  growth  of  wealth,  commerce,  and  manufacture, 
the  fall  of  the  old  colonial  system  and  the  gradual 
growth  of  a  new  one,  are  all  easily  included  under 
the  same  formula.  Lastly  this  formula  binds  to- 
gether the  past  of  England  and  her  future,  and  leaves 
us,  when  we  close  the  history  of  our  country,  not 
with  minds  fatigued  and  bewildered  as  though  from 
reading  a  story  that  has  been  too  much  spun  out, 
but  enlightened  and  more  deeply  interested  than  ever, 
because  partly  prepared  for  what  is  to  come  next. 

I  am  often  told  by  those  who,  like  myself,  study 
the  question  how  history  should  be  taught,  Oh,  you 
must  before  all  things  make  it  interesting !  I  agree 
with  them  in  a  certain  sense,  but  I  give  a  different 
sense  to  the  word  interesting — a  sense  which  after  all 
is  the  original  and  proper  one.  By  interesting  they 
mean  romantic,  poetical,  surprising ;  I  do  not  try  to 
make  history  interesting  in  this  sense,  because  I  have 
found  that  it  cannot  be  done  without  adulterating 
history  and  mixing  it  %vith  falsehood.  But  the  word 
interesting  does  not  properly  mean  romantic.  That 
is  interesting  in  the  proper  sense  which  affects  our 
interests,  which  closely  concerns  us  and  is  deeply  im- 
portant to  us.  I  have  tried  to  show  you  that  the 
history  of  modern  England  from  the  beginning  of 
the  eighteenth  centiu-y  is  interesting  in  this  sense, 


viii     •  RECAPITULATION  359 

because  it  is  pregnant  with  great  results  which  will 
affect  the  lives  of  ourselves  and  our  children  and  the 
future  greatness  of  our  country.  Make  history  inter- 
esting indeed  !  I  cannot  make  history  more  interest- 
ing than  it  is,  except  by  falsifying  it.  And  therefore 
when  I  meet  a  person  who  does  not  find  history  inter- 
esting, it  does  not  occur  to  me  to  alter  history, — I  try 
to  alter  him. 


THE  END 


Printed  by  R.  &  R.  Ci.ark,  Limited,  Edinburgh . 


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